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onthly. Per Year, $3.00 


™^HUDSON 




No. 4. January, 1895. 5° Cents 



i 


A WOMAN 



OF IMPULSE 


BY 


JUSTIN HUNTLY MCCARTHY 



G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 



NEW YORK II 7^ I LONDON 

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The Hudson Library 


A SERIES OF GOOD FICTION BY AUTHORS FROM EACH 
SIDE OF THE ATLANTIC. 


Published Bi-Monthly. Entered as second-class matter. 
Yearly Subscription, $3.00 ; per volume, paper, 50 cents ; 
cloth, $1 .00 

No. I. LOVE AND SHAWL-STRAPS. By Annette 
Lucille Noble, Author of “ Uncle Jack’s Executors,” 
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“Of such bright and entertaining stories as this we have none too many. 
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No. 3. HOW THANKFUL WAS BEWITCHED. 

By Jas. K. Hosmer, Author of “ The Story of the 
Jews,” etc. 

No. 4. A W^OMAN OF IMPULSE. By Justin Huntly 
M cCarthy. 


G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS, Publishers 
New York and London 


7 


A Woman of Impulse 



BY 


JUSTIN HUNTLY MCCARTHY 


»l 


“ Coincidence, coincidence, divine coincidence ! Let us at least cling 
to it in legend if we lack it plentifully in life. Let us remember that if 
romance is a mirror it is sometimes a magic mirror, and the sights that we 
see therein are governed, not by the weary laws of a workaday world, but 
by the wonders of an Arabian tale.” 


The Letters of Pertinax. 







G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 


NEW YORK 

27 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET 


LONDON 

24 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND 


Knickerbocker ^ress 

1895 



Copyright, 1895 


G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS 


Cbc *Rnicfterbocfter prcs 0 , 1Rew SJorb 


TO 

ZIFAH 

FROM 

HAFIZ 


MANDI KOM TUTI MIRI 
PIRINI LILENGRO MIRI 
MERIPENS ROMNI MIRI 
ZI SAR SORO MIRO TROOPO 
TA SORO MIRO BAVAL TA AJAW 
BITTO DINO MIRO KOMOBENS 
MANDI DAL TUTI AKOVA LIL 


I 



CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

I “ IS THIS THE FACE ?” 

II IN THE HOUSE OF ART 

III — “will this humor pass?” 

IV LOVE IN A VILLA 

V IN THE HOUSE .... 

VI A CABINET COUNCIL . 

VII A CONVERSATION 

VIII THE heart’s DESIRE . 

IX THE HOUSE OF ART . 

X NOX MIHI CANDIDA . 

XI THE PLEASURES OF FRIENDSHIP 

XII SOLEMN LEACxUE AND COVENANT 

XIII TO BE OR NOT TO BE . 

XIV THE DAWNING OF THE YEAR 

XV IN RICHMOND PARK . 

XVI — THE HOLLOW PLACE . 


PAGE 

I 

13 

26 

44 

65 

76 

87 

99 

103 

III 

119 

128 

135 

145 

152 

166 


Y 


VI 


Contents. 


CHAPTER PAGE 

XVII THE TURN OF HASSAN DRASS . . 175 

XVIII LONELY .192 

XIX MR. HEMPLETT ..... I96 

XX THE COMING MAN .... 205 

XXI VOX POPULI . . . . . 2 IT 

XXII THE INVASION OF BULLFORD . .221 

XXIII A WOODLAND WONDER . . . 233 

XXIV IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD . . 239 

XXV IN THE GREENWOOD . . . 253 

XXVI WELL STRUCK 265 

XXVH THE LADY OF THE HOUSE . . . 275 

XXVIII THE RIDDLE READ .... 286 


. 305 


XXIX TWO LETTERS 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE 


CHAPTER I. 

“is this the face ?" 

If I were half a poet, half a wit, 

I 'd write an epic or an epigram 
In praise of ladies. 

A Pastoral in Pink, 

A S he passed through the gates he paused for a 
moment to look, as with a fresh eye, upon a 
familiar scene. In the clearly bright March 
air the British Museum looked, for the moment, al- 
most white. In consequence it looked almost Greek 
— in the sense, that is to say, in which most people 
speak of a building that is built in what is called 
the classic style as looking Greek. Brander Swift 
thought of this as he paused, and it pleased him to 
remember that he was not as such folk are ; that 
he knew very well that a Grecian building of the 


2 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


size of the British Museum would have been a very 
blaze of color — amber and azure and hot ver- 
milion, and sumptuous with much gilding. Even 
with the thought he half laughed at himself for be- 
ing priggish ; but while he laughed he still paused, 
and, pausing, grew pensive. The pigeons that 
haunt the precincts of the Museum were fluttering 
about in all directions. In his sudden pensiveness 
Brander Swift almost sighed aloud. For the sight 
of the pigeons, and something in the keen quality 
of the sunlit air, had reminded him of Venice, and 
of the days of his youth. Brander Swift sighed 
again. Then becoming conscious that he was 
murmuring “ The days of my youth ! ” to himself 
softly, in a way that made for ridicule, he hurried 
forward to ascend the Museum steps. 

The phrase was still humming in his ears as he 
passed within the precincts of the Gaunt House of 
Art. It seemed to dominate him — to reduce him 
to a condition of absorbed contemplation. Under 
its influence he pocketed without a word the metal 
disc that represented his surrendered stick, and 
walked slowly into the first of the Graeco-Roman 
galleries. 

The days of his youth ! What was there, after 
all, in that collocation of words which need appal 
him? To be three-and-thirty is to be but a boy, 
he had assured himself often before this time, and 


IS THIS THE FACE- 


? 


3 


<< 


he now reassured himself vehemently with a kind of 
petulant insistence, as he moved onward among the 
monumental visages of the lords of Rome. For, 
all of a sudden, he seemed to have grown old ; all 
of a sudden, his easy-going life, that habitually 
moved with the measure of a patient stream, seemed 
to have changed its temper, and to be racing with 
merciless rapidity towards its goal. Brander Swift 
shivered uneasily as he looked about him. 

What had he come for ? He answered his own 
question at once with a brisk mendacity. He had 
come to refresh his mind with the contemplation of 
certain Grecian images, the wreckage of that lost 
civilization. But even as he so answered himself 
he laughed, for he knew that he was lying — lying 
very pitifully and very cheaply. Brander Swift had 
a right to laugh at himself, for if there was one 
thing that he hated more than another, it was lying : 
and lying to himself was just as bad as lying to 
other people. 

There was no use, after all, in keeping up to him- 
self the affectation that he had come to the Museum 
that morning bent upon the study of forgotten gods 
or heroes. The affectation was pretentious — it 
lacked substance ; it did not carry conviction with 
it. It had been so far effectual that it had induced 
him to leave his papers and his proof sheets, put on 
his hat and make his way from the quiet of Queen 


4 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Square to the Museum. But having done so much, 
the deception suddenly avowed itself to be a flimsy 
fraud, and deserted him altogether. 

He had come to the Museum as the gambler 
comes to the green cloth — a child of chance. His 
conscience, now thoroughly naked and ashamed, 
confessed aloud that he had come to the Temple of 
Learning moved by no desire for deeper erudition, 
moved by no desire to look on some dead face made 
monumental in stone, but only by the faint hope 
and the fond desire to look again upon a living face 
— upon the face of a girl. He had seen the face 
only twice in his life, twice before, at about the 
same hour as now and in about the same place. It 
was a very beautiful face, the most beautiful face 
he had ever seen, he assured himself now as he 
drifted through the gallery. 

W'^hile his bodily eyes were glancing in all di- 
rections among the statues to see if she whom he 
sought were there, his mental vision feasted on the 
face that had haunted him for half a week. But 
though it showed very plainly in his mind’s glass, 
he could not very readily reduce its beauties to 
words. She had dark hair and dark blue eyes ; 
her face was finely oval ; her color was rather 
warm than pale ; the quality of her complexion 
was delicate with an air of Southern delicacy ; her 
lips were very vividly red. All these were exqui- 


“IS THIS THE FACE ?” 


5 


site items that did not in their enumeration paint 
a very decided picture. Brander Swift felt that 
he would scarcely succeed in conveying to any one 
else the attraction, the victorious beauty, of the 
face that he had seen twice and that he was now \ 
hoping with all his heart he would be lucky enough 
to see for a third time. 

As he moved along the galleries he pleased and 
teased himself with reminiscences. To-day was 
Monday. He had seen her for the first time on 
the previous Friday. He had come to the Museum 
on that Friday as he had been wont to come there 
any day, on and off, for years back ; he had come 
then really to do what he now shammed to be do- 
ing, to consult some relic of the past. He saw her 
first in the long Grecian gallery where the spoils 
of the Parthenon repose. Her beauty had first 
attracted him, then her evident interest in things 
that interested him to his heart’s core, then the 
difference in her bearing and habit to those who 
were the familiars of the sculpture galleries. 

Although he had no very ready appreciation of 
the niceties of women’s wear, he had noted that if 
her dress hinted on austerity it did not suggest 
poverty. He cited to himself Milton’s rendering 
of Horace, “ simple in neatness,” but he immedi- 
ately rejected the citation as conveying too meagre 
an appreciation of the girl’s appearance. Neatness 


6 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


seemed but a workaday, domestic merit in divin- 
ity. He had a kind of consciousness that her 
gloves were finely fashioned, that her hat had no 
home-made air about it, that the sombre brown of 
her gown, the sombre black of her winter coat, sug- 
gested an entirely voluntary gravity of hue, that 
the texture was fine and finely cut. In fact, she 
left on his mind the impression of a well clothed 
young woman to whom the being well clothed was 
a habitual state, an unbroken custom. 

When he had seen her for the first time his at- 
tention had been arrested by her graceful carriage, 
by something delicate in the turn of the neck, in 
the poise of the head, by fine shape’ suggested 
through the thickness of a winter habit. Then, as 
he passed, she turned, and he saw her face, and its 
beauty conquered him. He passed her again and 
again, doing his best to appear intent upon the 
statues, doing his best to make his eyes when they 
met hers seem merely indifferent. When he felt 
that he had no decent excuse to make to himself 
for lingering longer, he went away, went into the 
Assyrian rooms and confided to the images of As- 
sur-bani-pal that he had just seen the most beauti- 
ful woman in the world. 

Dead Assyria received the tidings with indiffer- 
ence. Whereupon a great weariness of dead Assy- 
ria came over Swift’s soul, and he assured himself 


IS THIS THE FACE- 


? 


7 


<< 


that it was his duty to blot out the memory of its 
grotesqueness by another sight of the flawless forms 
of Attica. But when he had got back to the Elgin 
Room, he found that his passion for the flawless 
forms of Attica paled and waned. For the girl who 
had been among them so short a time before had 
gone, and though Swift went religiously all over 
the Museum at a pace that amazed its calm custo- 
dians, he did not see her again. He thought about 
her a good deal, instead, and felt, almost for the 
first time in his life, that he would like to be able 
to express himself in rhyme. 

The next day, the Saturday, he returned to the 
Museum. He scarcely hoped to see her. He rec- 
ognized the extreme unlikelihood that such a girl 
would come to the British Museum day after day, 
or would come at the same hour to the same place. 
But though he argued against his hopes, he went to 
the Elgin Room none the less directly, and there, 
to his amazement and delight, he saw her again. 
Once again, as he passed her, she turned her head, 
and once again the same living joy in her beauty 
came to conquer him. 

This time he had acted more audaciously. He 
had remained in the Elgin Room, skulking behind 
the statues, furtively looking at the beautiful girl 
while he pretended to be wholly absorbed in his 
minute investigations of the ruined Jaw of a river- 


8 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


horse or a limb of the Duke of Athens. As she 
stood there, looking so steadily at the shattered 
masterpiece, her bearing charmed him in its youth- 
ful suppleness, in its youthful strength. But it was 
her face that most enchanted him ; her face, to see 
which he lingered behind pedestals, guiltily, feel- 
ing like a spy, but unable to resist spying. It is 
the privilege of young men to think most raptu- 
rously upon a woman’s face, and Brander Swift 
was still a young man. That salacious cynic, Ste- 
phen Budget, would doubtless have looked upon 
the unknown beauty with very different eyes, and 
with a very different delight. But Brander Swift 
never saw with the eyes, and never thought with 
the mind, of Stephen Budget, and it was enough 
for him now to gaze upon the girl with something 
of that divine rapture that fills the speech of Mar- 
lowe’s Faustus when he beholds the resuscitated 
Helen. 

But, as he now remembered wistfully, he was 
not given much time wherein to gaze. He could 
not guess whther the girl had or had not noticed 
his sufficiently clumsy attempts to play the unper- 
ceived spy. At least, she showed no sign of being 
aware of his pertinacity, but pursued her study as 
composedly as if she and her group had been alone 
in the world together. But as soon as she had 
finished that study she walked away so rapidly 


IS THIS THE FACE- 


9 


<< 


?” 


that she was in the next room before Swift quite 
recovered from his surprise at her action, and she 
was almost out of sight before he had determined 
to take some action himself. 

Swift’s action had taken the simple form of fol- 
lowing the girl. He followed her course sharply 
enough to see her pass through the swinging glass 
doors into the street. Swift remembered well the 
momentary hesitation that held him as she passed 
out. But the doors had scarcely ceased to oscil- 
late before he put his hand to them ; the girl was 
not at the bottom of the steps before he had passed 
through the doors and was standing on the top of 
the steps. 

Now his memories were coming to an end. As 
she crossed the courtyard he followed her at a 
definite distance, for he had it in his mind to hunt 
her, an unsuspecting quarry, to her home. But 
was she so wholly unsuspecting ? As she came 
near to the gate, she paused in her progress and 
looked behind her — looked straight at him. The 
expression of her face was inscrutable. A vainer 
man than Swift might have read an invitation into 
the action ; another, vainer too, but in a different 
way, might have found therein a reproof, a rebuff. 
There was no sign in the girl’s face to justify either 
interpretation, yet that pause had proved enough to 
turn Brander from his half-formed purpose. The 


10 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


girl crossed the street, and disappeared. Swift had 
made no attempt to keep her in sight. He had 
only shrugged his shoulders. 

“ What should such a fellow as I do,” he had 
said to himself, “ in the pursuit of adventures ? 
I am no hero of romance ; go to, let me at least 
remember to be a gentleman, and not a jackass.” 

His thoughts had recoiled from his rooms and his 
work. So he had walked to Regent’s Park, and 
wandered there for a long time in its fields and 
groves, and in all his wanderings he saw but one 
face which burned before his face in the clear air 
as sun-spots do when the eyes have looked too long 
upon the sun. He had walked till he was tired, 
thinking the youngest thoughts, and he remem- 
bered now how he had smiled at their sweetness, 
and how he had laughed at himself for being 
such an oaf of a schoolboy at his age. At last, 
when the day began to darken, he had turned 
homewards, still musing upon the face. In the eve- 
ning he had dined with Stephen Budget, and had 
found that it was not easy to preserve a sentimental 
mood in the neighborhood of Budget’s cynicism. 
But while he listened to Budget’s talk and warmed 
his feet by Budget’s fire, his mind every now and 
then would free itself from its environment. Then, 
while the sound of Budget’s fat laugh grew fainter. 
Swift would imagine himself to be back again 


“IS THIS THE FACE ?” 


II 


in the long white room, where a beautiful girl 
looked at the ragged hulk of Greek glory. Budget 
noted at last his guest’s inattention, and grew 
slightly snappish, so Swift had pleaded fatigue 
and said good-night. And as he wandered back 
through the silent Bloomsbury streets, he was still 
meditating upon the one theme, and murmuring in 
his mind some old Greek words that he but half 
remembered, in which Plato asks if his star looks 
up at those stars, and wishes that he were as the 
fields of heaven, that with its myriad eyes he might 
behold her face. 

These memories came thickly to Swift now — 
these and memories of that long Sunday, which was 
only yesterday, when he had idled in Kensington 
Gardens, and wondered why chance did not for 
once prove propitious and bring her to wander, too, 
in Kensington Gardens. Chance was not propitious, 
at which Swift had felt foolishly querulous. He 
was dining out that evening, with his friends the 
Windovers. As a rule he was very happy at those 
modest little banquets, with that amiable jour- 
nalist and his witty, pretty wife. But on this occa- 
sion he had proved but poor company, for he was 
occupying himself all the time with the problem 
whether he would be a greater fool to go to the 
British Museum on the following day, on the very 
slender chance of seeing her there again, or a 


12 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


greater fool to stay away, and lose even a slender 
chance of seeing her. 

When he had gone to bed that night he had 
made up his mind that he would stay at home and 
stick to his work, and forget all about the British 
Museum and its beauty. It was only natural, 
therefore, after this deep resolve, that the follow- 
ing noontide should find him in the Museum gal- 
leries, moving nervously towards the Elgin Room. 


CHAPTER II. 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART. 

The gods are all forgotten long ago, 

The merry gods to whom the Grecians prayed 
In those soft words so honey-sweet to flow 
Like some rare vintage that for long has stayed 
Deep-hidden in some happy earthen jar 
Whose ruddy grapes were ripely grown beneath some 
fortunate star. 

The Gods of Hellas. 

T he Elgin Room was empty when Brander 
Swift entered it. Empty, that is to say, 
for him. The usual official, with the usual 
wand, dozed the usual doze in the usual well worn 
chair. Here and there the conventional art-stu- 
dents, male and female, held sway, with easels, and 
bread-crumbs, and strenuous canvases. But to 
Swift the room seemed as desolate as a desert. 

He lounged to the end of the room in a sour 
temper, laughing somewhat spitefully at himself. 
What a fool he had been to suppose that she would 
come again, or, at least, to presume that she would 
of necessity come for the third time at the same 
hour, and come to precisely the same place. He 
13 


14 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


caught himself surveying with disdain the column 
of Ephesus, and in despair at his blasphemy he 
turned away. But in another second he had swung 
back, his face flaming, his eyes fixed upon the col- 
umn, his heart beating as if it had suddenly dis- 
covered for itself the law of circulation, and was 
unduly revelling in emotional experience. For the 
girl of his day-dreams was walking with her wonted 
quick walk up the room in the direction of the spot 
where he stood. His first thought was one of al- 
most unblended joy. His second thought was one 
of almost unblended pain. The joy was the joy 
of seeing her again, the pain that of being discov- 
ered, and discovered so flagrantly, playing the spy. 

He drew back hurriedly, pretending to be wholly 
absorbed by the investigation of a neighboring 
piece of sculpture. She came nearer and nearer, 
and though he did not dare to look up, he meas- 
ured her approach by the beating of his heart, by 
the trembling of his hands. His head seemed to 
swim, and for a moment he felt as if he should 
like to cry out. Then he thrust his hands into 
the pockets of his coat, and clenched them, with 
the dogged resolve to look at the girl with as 
much indifference as if he had never seen her 
in his life before. She was quite close to him, 
standing opposite to the Ephesian pillar, with her 
eyes fixed upon its marred beauty. The determi- 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART. 


15 


nation to act exactly as if he were unconscious of 
her presence decided him to move from where he 
was standing and survey the column too — at least, 
that was the reason he offered to his conscience, 
in order to efface the other, the simpler and more 
sensible reason, that he wanted to stand near her 
and steal a closer look at her face. 

If that was his desire his desire was not disap- 
pointed. As he drew near to her, affecting an ab- 
sorbing interest in the pillar, the woman turned her 
head and looked at him. He felt the blood flooding 
his cheeks as he looked back at her, unable to avert 
his eyes, longing to say something, anything, that 
would express his admiration, and entreat pardon 
for having expressed it. But before he could put 
this faltering desire from him, to his inexpressible 
surprise, the girl, still looking at him, spoke to him. 

“ Are you a student of these things ? ” she said, 
pointing at the carved cylinder. “ Do you under- 
stand Greek statues and stories — and all that ? ” 

The tone of her voice was quite composed, with 
a faintly rising inflection, the inflection of a well 
bred voice, that often carries with it a suggestion 
of unconscious, innate condescension towards the 
person addressed. Her face was unmoved ; there 
was scarcely a tinge of deeper color in her cheeks, 
and her blue eyes looked the most natural inquiry. 
Her whole bearing suggested that it was the most 


l6 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

ordinary thing in the world for her to do — to put 
such a question to the stranger by her side. 

But Swift was as much startled as if he had sud- 
denly been struck in the face. He was scarcely able 
to realize his delight in being addressed by her. He 
knew that when he spoke he should stammer — and 
he did. 

“ I beg your pardon,” he replied ; ‘‘ I think I do, 
a little — just a little.” 

He felt that he cut a poor figure ; he would have 
liked to reply in an epigram, and he had only stut- 
tered out an awkward sentence. He felt that he 
looked shy and stupid, and probably hot. But the 
girl did not seem to be in the least conscious of his 
embarrassment. 

“ I thought it possible that you might be,” she 
said, still with the same composure. “ Seeing you 
here so often, I imagined that we must be fellow- 
students, and that, as you were a man, you would 
be sure to know so much more about it than I do. 
And I thought that perhaps you would not object 
to enlighten my ignorance on one point.” 

Object ! If she had asked him to carry off the 
Theseus bodily upon his back he would have made 
a gallant effort to do so in her service. And she 
said that she had seen him before, several times. 
The thought was bewildering, the whole situation 
was bewildering. 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART. 1 7 

‘‘Well* yes,” he said ; “ I suppose I do under- 
stand something about these things. You see, it 
is more or less my business to understand them.” 

The girl looked pleased, and her eyes smiled. 

“ I was sure you did — from the way in which 
you looked at them. People always look differ- 
ently at things which they understand.” 

Swift wondered how he looked at her, for he felt 
sure that he did not understand her, and even as 
he wondered there came into his mind a feeling 
that he never would understand her. But, after 
all, that was for the future. He delighted now in 
the present and its unexpected gift, and he sought 
to make the most of it. 

“ You wished to ask me a question,” he said, and 
as he spoke he assumed, with difficulty, a solemn, 
even a pompous manner, which he felt must be 
laughable. But the girl did not laugh. 

“Yes,” she answered. “Yes, I thought you 
might tell me exactly what that figure meant.” And 
she pointed again at the cylinder, pointed at the 
winged figure bearing a sword. 

Swift immediately launched out into a lengthy 
explanation. He cited scraps of Greek authors. 
He made learned references to eminent German 
authorities. He delivered a lecture in little upon 
his theme which he felt would adorn a possible 
Primer of Culture, and as he did so he hoped fer- 


i8 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


vently that he was making an impression, and /not 
making an exhibition of himself. / 

The girl took his harangue, however, very pa- 
tiently, with many signs of interest, with no sign of 
amusement. When he had finished, she thanked 
him quite simply. 

“ Thank you very much. You have told me a 
great deal that I did not know and that I am quite 
sure I ought to know, and I am very much in- 
debted to you indeed. 

He assured her that he was only too happy to be 
of the least assistance to her, and that if there were 
any further information he could give her, then, or 
at any other time, he would count himself privi- 
leged in^ being allowed to do so. He added, lest 
his speech should seem too eager, more interested 
in the woman than in the woman’s occupation, that 
it was somewhat rare for him to meet with any one 
taking a living interest in studies that were so dear 
to him. 

“ Indeed ! ” said the girl, with just the faintest 
expression of surprise upon her face — “ indeed ! 
I thought that everybody went in for Greek things 
nowadays.” 

She uttered the phrase “ Greek things ” with a 
pretty unconscious air of superiority, which seemed 
to sum up the whole Greek world, from Mycenae to 
Byzantium, in a catalogue of elegant accomplish- 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART^ 


19 


merits. The young man felt that it was his duty 
to protest, but his conscience allowed him a com- 
promise. He must utter a rebuke, but he would 
utter it with a smile. 

“ A good many people like to play with serious 
subjects,” he began, in a tone of genial austerity, 
which was dissipated by the girl’s prompt interrup- 
tion. 

“ Play ? — yes. Why not ? And don’t you ? I 
wish we played with things a good deal more some- 
times. We leave off playtime too soon. Some peo- 
ple would like us to be serious in the nursery, and 
earnest over Noah’s ark.” 

The young man frowned slightly. Pages from the 
Cry for Liberty reasserted themselves in his mind. 

“ I am afraid I can not agree with you,” he began. 
“ I think that we all take our lives far too lightly.” 

He paused for an instant, conscious of his own 
unnecessary earnestness. The girl took the oppor- 
tunity of the pause to interrupt him again. 

“ ‘ Life is real, life is earnest,’ and all that sort of 
thing,” she said ; and, saying it, her lips parted in a 
very decided smile which showed that she had white 
and shapely teeth. 

This discovery, giving, as it were, the final touch 
to the attraction of her face, did something to con- 
sole Swift for the little sneer with which she had 
pricked his vehemence by a deliberately common- 


20 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


place quotation. He stuck to his guns, but he 
laughed now good-humoredly. 

“ Yes,” he said ; “lam old-fashioned enough, or 
new-fashioned enough — for I really do not know 
which it is — to think that life is real and that life 
is earnest, and I am grateful to the American and 
to any one else who asserts it manfully. But forgive 
me for seeming to force an argument. May we go 
back again to Greece ? ” 

“ I am afraid I must go back to a more common- 
place spot than Greece,” said the girl — “ to my own 
diggings. The time has gone pleasantly ” — here she 
gave a grateful glance — “ and learnedly ” — here a 
gleam of mischief shone in the eyes that looked so 
calmly into his. 

He felt himself flush ; he felt that his heart was 
beginning to disturb itself again in the pang of this 
parting. He clasped his hand nervously ; then he 
said : 

“ I am going away myself. May I — will you al- 
low me to walk with you through the corridors ? 
We might see something worth a word on our way.” 

If the girl felt any surprise at the suggestion, she 
certainly betrayed none. She took it, or seemed 
to take it, as the most natural thing in the world. 

“ That will be very kind of you,” she said ; and 
in another instant Swift found himself walking by 
her side along the gallery. 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART. 


21 


He did not notice — or, if he noticed, he did not 
heed — how some of the students stared to see the 
well dressed, handsome girl walk away with the 
awkward-looking young man in the well worn tweed 
suit of a tawny yellow color. Brander Swift was 
indifferent as to his attire. He liked his clothes to 
be comfortable, and the longer he wore them the 
more comfortable he found them ; and he had a 
decided predilection for tweeds of a tawny yellow 
favor. Besides, distinction in dress was opposed 
to all his theories — incompatible with the Cry for 
Liberty. He was, it is true, aware that his compan- 
ion was well dressed,- but it had not as yet occurred 
to him that his own habit did not consort well with 
hers. 

They walked back through the galleries for some 
enchanted moments — moments in which Swift 
found that his new conception of the ideal was to 
wander for ever in a sculpture gallery, pointing out 
the beauties of a battered antiquity to a girl di- 
vinely beautiful and for ever young. He had 
scarcely arrived at this decision, when they found 
themselves in the last gallery, and within a few yards 
of the door. 

Swift felt with an aching heart that the time for 
parting had come. His head was still in a whirl, 
and while he discoursed learnedly, he was still ask- 
ing himself how this wonder had come to pass. 


22 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


And now the wonder was about to pass away, and 
he could think of nothing that he might rightly 
urge in favor of its renewal. For it did not occur 
to him for a single second that there might, per- 
haps, be no need for him to stand on ceremony with 
a girl who spoke first to a stranger in a public place. 

To gain a few more instants of her companion- 
ship, he called her attention to a bust that was la- 
belled as the bust of an unknown Roman poet. 

“ If you look closely at it,” he said, “ you will 
see that it is not altogether unlike the face of Dante. 
Do you know, it has always pleased me to think of 
this unknown Roman poet as a man of great ideas, 
splendid thoughts which he was never able to utter, 
and that he lived unknown and passed away un- 
known without expressing them ; but that, long cen- 
turies after, the soul of that nameless Roman poet 
passed into the body of a young Florentine gentle- 
man, and that the name of that Florentine was 
Dante Alighieri.” 

“ You might make a poem of that,” said the girl, 
“ or a story, and call it The Unfulfilled SoulT 

“ I would if I could,” said Swift rather sadly. 
“ But I am afraid I am too practical for that sort 
of thing.” 

“ You were not too practical to think it,” the girl 
said. “ If you can think it, why could you not say 
it?” 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART. 


23 


“There are many things I think,” said Swift, 
“ which I cannot say.” 

Something in the tone of his voice brought for 
the first time a deeper color to her cheeks, gave 
for the first time a quality of uneasiness to her 
manner. 

“ I must really go now,” she said rather hurriedly. 
“ Thank you ever so much for your kindness.” 

“ Please forgive me,” Swift said quickly, “ if I 
express myself badly. I am not good at putting 
things cleverly ; but may I not hope — may I not 
think there is a chance — that we may meet again ? ” 

“ There is always that chance in life,” she an- 
swered. 

“ I know,” he said. “ But I should like to think 
that the chance was rather a good chance in this 
case. You see,” he went on apologetically, “ I am 
so deeply interested in all this sort of thing, and it 
is such a pleasure to find some one who is in sympa- 
thy ; and if I could be of any use to you in your 
studies — why, I should be delighted, really de- 
lighted ! ” 

“ Thank you ! ” she said. “ I understand. 
Archaeology is an abiding joy. I am not much of 
a student, but I am glad that you think I am sym- 
pathetic.” 

“ Indeed — of course — naturally,” said Swift. 
Her face was grave, her eyes were grave, her lips 


24 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


were gravely set. Yet, though her face was thus 
mirthless, Swift entertained a dim disagreeable im- 
pression that possibly the girl was laughing at him. 
Her next words reassured him. 

“ I do not think that I shall be able to pursue my 
studies of the antique any more this week.” 

Swift’s face fell at these words, but it lightened 
again at their successors. 

But I hope, if I can, to come again on this 
day week, and, of course, if you happen to be here 
and to have nothing better to do than to waste 
some minutes teaching an ignorant young woman, 
why, it will be very kind of you.” 

“ At about the same time ? ” Swift asked ; and 
the girl, with a sudden smile, answered him : 

“ Yes ; about the same time.” 

She held out her hand, and it rested for a mo- 
ment in Swift’s. Then it was withdrawn, and be- 
fore he could quite realize the sense of loss that 
seized him, she was passing through the doorway 
into the hall, and he was standing by himself. 
He saw her pass out through the swinging doors. 
As the doors clashed behind her he looked again 
upon the head of the Roman poet, upon the visage 
of the Unfulfilled Soul. 

“ How shall I sleep out this great gap of time ? ” 
he asked himself. “What centuries seem to lie 
between to-day and this day week ! ” 


IN THE HOUSE OF ART. 


25 


The Museum had suddenly lost all interest for 
him. As he turned to leave he felt his foot touch 
something. A little bunch of violets lay at his 
feet, the bunch of violets that the girl had been 
wearing. 

Blessed chance ! ” he said to himself, as he 
stooped to pick up the treasure. Then he saw 
that it was not merely a trifling posy which he had 
found, and might very well feel privileged to keep. 
For the bunch of violets carried with it the gold 
brooch that had served to fasten the flowers to the 
girl’s dress. It was fashioned in the shape of a 
serpent with its tail in its mouth, like the Serpent 
of the Norse legend. 

Swift promptly ran out of the room, dashed 
through the swinging doors and down the steps 
across the courtyard into Great Russell Street in 
pursuit of the departed owner. But though he 
searched in all directions he could find no trace of 
the girl. 

“ Well,” said Swift, looking fondly at the flowers 
and their fastening as they lay in his hand, “ a 
week is a long time to wait, but at least I shall 
have my talisman through the weary waste of 
days.” 

And then he kissed the violets. 


CHAPTER III. 


“ WILL THIS HUMOR PASS ? 

A week ? go to ! 

Each separate day sums up a century, 

Each hour becomes a lifelong agony, 

And every single second of each hour 
Lives a moon’s life. 

The Beggars' Comedy. 

O NE of the gnomic sentences of Goethe 
buzzed in Swift’s mind; ‘‘Hold fast by 
the present ! Every situation — nay, every 
moment — is of infinite value, for it is the repre- 
sentative of a whole eternity.” Swift’s German 
studies had enriched his mind with a number of 
aphorisms, with which it was his delight to sustain 
himself. Therefore, at the beginning of the week 
of probation the counsel of Goethe had come into 
his mind, and he quoted it with comfort, and re- 
solved that he would live up to it. It was no doubt 
true that he was longing for something that might 
happen at the end of seven days ; but in the mean- 
time there were those seven days to be lived 
through, and each day, nay, every second of each 
26 


“will this humor pass?’’ 


27 


day, the representative — so the sonorous phrase 
ran — of a whole eternity. 

Swift’s first resolve was simple. He would bury 
himself in his books ; he would work hard, work 
as he had never worked before. There was Kel- 
lerman’s History of the Art Unions of Attica lying 
uncut upon his table, waiting its turn to be trans- 
lated as soon as he had finished Holtzapfel’s Stud- 
ies hi Pelasgian Socialism^ of which there were now 
only a few pages to do. His course was clear. He 
would polish off Holtzapfel at once — thus lightly 
did he speak of the laboriously learned scholar 
who illuminated Europe from the Poppelsdorf 
Allee — and then he would tackle Kellerman, and 
make such a hole in him as would astonish Cripple 
& Co. 

Cripple & Co. were not an easily astonished body. 
They knew that they could rely upon the clear- 
ness of his manuscript, and the decent fidelity with 
which he executed their commissions. But up to 
this time he had not startled them, or attempted to 
startle them, by being long ahead of his engage- 
ments. Well, he would be now, he determined. 
He would show the world what high passion could 
do in the space of seven days. He only wished 
that he had a photograph of the beloved on his 
table to inspire him at his work. 

The high passion inspired him for a couple of 


28 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


hours. Holtzapfel’s harsh German yielded to his 
divine rage, and it was with a feeling of triumph 
that he inscribed the words “ The End ” on the 
last page of his translation, and put the manuscript 
into an envelope addressed to Messrs. Cripple & 
Co. Then he reached out his hand to Kellerman’s 
volume, and began to cut the leaves. 

But he had not made his way through more than 
a score of pages before he began to feel restless. It 
was curious, he reflected, that he had not noticed 
before how commonplace and monotonous his 
life was becoming. It had not occurred to him 
for long enough to question the method of his 
life, the manner of its daily passage. To regard 
the Cry for Liberty as a creed ; to translate Ger- 
man scholarship for Messrs. Cripple & Co. ; to 
spread the light lit by Lassalle and Marx among 
his comrades ; to see much of Stephen Budget, 
and more of the Windovers, had seemed to him a 
very sufficing existence. Now he suddenly dis- 
covered that it was not sufficing, that it wanted 
color — the color of a girl’s dark hair, of a girl’s 
blue eyes, of a girl’s red mouth. 

His life did not seem as excellent a piece of busi- 
ness as he had taken it to be. He reviewed the 
somewhat isolated education of his boyhood ; the 
youthful years of European travel ; the German 
University ; the return to England, to begin life 


“ WILL THIS HUMOR PASS?” 


29 


for himself with his way to make ; his ambition to 
reform the social state ; his studies of the labor 
life and the labor problems ; his comradeship with 
workingmen ; his membership of the Cordeliers’ 
Club. 

All these phases of his life floated before his 
mind one by one, like pictures in a book. He had 
had his struggles, he had had his little successes. 
Was not his book, the Cry for Liberty^ one of the 
bibles of the Cordeliers’ Club, and the armory of 
so many of the leaders and thinkers and speakers 
of the new movement ? It had been quoted in the 
House of Commons, attacked, laughed at, de- 
nounced by the reactionary press, applauded by 
the organs of advanced thought ; he had been 
told again and again, by disciples of the cause, 
that he had written a great book, and there were 
sweet moments in which he allowed himself to be 
tempted to believe them. 

“ Every man,” Budget once said to Windover, 
speaking of Swift, “ every man makes some blun- 
der early in life which he has to pass the rest of 
his existence in maintaining not to be a blunder. 
With most men this cross takes the form of mar- 
riage. With Swift it is the Cry for Liberty^ 

Windover did not resent the allusion to marriage. 
It was Budget’s way to say things of that kind to 
people they might hurt, but Windover remained 


30 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


unwounded. He agreed so far with Budget that 
he did think the Cry for Liberty a calamity in 
Swift’s career. To him the Cry for Liberty appeared 
to be a confused and imperfectly comprehended 
combination of the principles of the Jacobin 
Club, with the most fanciful forms of socialism 
that German thinkers and Russian dreamers had 
yet evolved. Such a political creed did not make 
Windover positively ,angry, but it had a tendency 
to make him peevish. He could not understand 
Swift’s fierce indignation with the injustices of life, 
and Swift’s wild schemes for redressing those in- 
justices. 

But Swift had an affection for the Cry for Lib- 
erty. It had carried, as he believed, the banner 
of progress at least one step farther in the great 
struggle ; there was one entrenchment the less to 
win. It expounded with eloquence and with con- 
viction theories of the relation of man and woman, 
of capital and labor, of belief and action. Plato 
and Lassalle, Balzac and Buddha, Diderot and Mill, 
Comte and Spencer, St. Simon and Schopenhauer, 
and Fourier and Bebel, and Herzen and Marx, and 
more, had gone to the making of the book, and the 
book had carried a compounded creed in many 
directions, and had made disciples in centres of 
work and struggle who quoted Brander Swift with 
rapture, and Brander Swift had always thought 


WILL THIS HUMOR PASS?” 


31 


such approval was the richest reward that life could 
offer him. 

But now, quite suddenly, the reward did not 
seem to be so satisfactory as he had thought. A 
new emotion thrust itself into the life that was di- 
vided between his hours of study in his own room 
and his hours of East End platforms and commit- 
tees and addresses in St. Ethelfreda’s Without. It 
was unsettling to a sensible man, unsettling as 
spring winds. 

“ I wish that it were this day week ” he said to 
himself with a sigh, as he closed Kellerman and 
pushed him impatiently away. Had Kellerman 
ever been in love ? Swift was inclined to think 
not ; surely, if he ever had, some touch of soft- 
ness, some gleam of grace, would have lightened 
the load of his intolerable learning. 

That learning should not further vex his soul 
that day, so Swift resolved. He pushed his papers 
disdainfully aside, piled his .dictionaries in a heap, 
and decided that he would go and see the Win- 
dovers. They were always tranquillizing, and he 
felt that his new excitement needed calm. In his 
heart he held a very strong desire to tell his little 
unformed, fantastic love story to Mrs. Windover. 
There was one thing she certainly would not do ; 
she would not laugh at him ; and it seemed to him 
as if it would be sweet to confide so sweet a secret 


32 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


to SO sweet a woman. On the other hand, he did 
not feel quite sure that the secret was wholly his, 
to do as he pleased with — to tell or to conceal. 
The exquisite unknown had laid no pledge upon 
him ; but she had promised another meeting after 
a definite interval. Would it be wholly gallant 
during that interval to say anything about the mat- 
ter even to so lovable and loyal a friend as Lucilla 
Windover ? 

‘‘ It is, or should be, very easy to hold one’s 
tongue,” he said aloud to the bust of Dante on his 
chimney-piece. Then, with that solemn sentence 
still in his mind, he hurried out to salute the after- 
noon. 

The day fulfilled the promise of its dawn. Even 
in its decline it boasted a resemblance to a summer 
day. The air still exercised a tonic influence ; and 
Swift walked along, if not in the best of spirits, at 
least in very good spirits. He noted now that when 
a man who has definitely said good-bye to boyhood 
is so wise or so foolish as to fall in love after the 
fantastical fashion of boyhood, the result may de- 
light, but there is a tinge of melancholy in the 
pleasure. 

There were certainly two ways of looking at 
the emotion which domineered him. If Romance 
seemed to smile upon a young gentleman in yel- 
low, whose heart was lifted up for the sake of a 


“ WILL THIS HUMOR PASS ? ” 


33 


girl whom he had seen thrice, spoken to once, and 
whose very name he did not know. Mirth seemed 
to leer at him for an ape who wrongfully mimicked 
the gracious follies of youth. Romance wore in 
Swift’s mind the eyes and hair of the unknown ; 
indeed, he believed that she would not laugh at 
his homage. Mirth grinned with the thick lips of 
Stephen Budget, and Swift knew very well what 
the tender, what the sentimental, had to expect 
from that second-rate cynic who quoted Schopen- 
hauer from a handbook. 

He made his way as quickly as he could through 
the streets that lay between him and the liberal 
air of Regent’s Park. 

Swift loved his park dearly, and came there often 
to breathe clean air and rest his eyes with green- 
ness. But on this afternoon he did not enter the 
park itself. He chose instead, as he often chose 
in those walks of his, to follow the road that swept 
all round the park. He kept to the unpaved path 
that kinged the palings ; it was more like a coun- 
try road than the paved way opposite, with its 
palisade of mansions. In the dusk of the evening 
these mansions, with their pillars and their statues 
and all the rest of their forged classicism, wore at 
least the dignity of size tempered by obscurity. 

Swift swung along rapidly, his gaze less often on 
the houses than over the palings at his left. In the 

3 


34 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


still clear air the aspect of the park charmed. A 
web of mist gave delicacy to outline — gave soft- 
ness to the color of the grass and the darkness of 
distant trees, making the place wear the aspect of a 
landscape seen in a dream. The grace of the scene 
was not marred by the presence of many people. 
Groups were scattered, few and far apart, upon the 
lawns ; they seemed to Swift like thin shades wan- 
dering in the kingdom of shadows. 

The walk delighted Swift so much that, when he 
came to the gate through, which he usually passed in 
order to make his way to the Windovers, he paused 
for a moment in a hesitation that soon changed to 
decision. He would not yet commit himself to 
streets again ; he would get at the Windovers by a 
longer, lovelier way. The cool air tempted to as- 
cent ; he resolved that he would go over Primrose 
Hill, and fall, as it were, down from the skies upon 
his friends. 

There are no doubt plenty of Londoners who do 
not know Primrose Hill at all, or who, if they do 
know it, at least do not go near it from year’s end 
to year’s end. Swift thought of them and pitied 
them. 

The hill rose up in front of him : a sufficiently 
imposing monticule, a suggestion of the pastoral, 
almost of the wild, in the urban tameness around. 
There was hardly any one about ; on the summit a 


WILL THIS HUMOR PASS?” 


35 


few persons were silhouetted against the nacre of 
the sky. Swift, determined to add himself to their 
number, began to climb. It was really something 
of a climb. The warm rains that had heralded this 
false dawn of spring had made the earth soft and 
clinging, hampering Swift’s advance. It was ap- 
propriate, however, he thought, as he remembered 
the old rhyme about Primrose Hill, and how Prim- 
rose Hill was dirty. 

“ Shall I meet a pretty girl ? ” he asked himself ; 
“ and will she drop me a curtsey ? ” 

He was obliged to take time over the ascent, but 
he got to the top at last, warm of face and muddy 
of feet, and, pausing, looked about him. 

There were very few people on the top of the hill. 
A young lady in a bright-blue gown was flirting 
briskly with a still younger gentleman in a hat 
several sizes too large for him. The pair sat upon 
one of the wooden benches, indifferent to the chilli- 
ness of the evening, indifferent to the prospect that 
lay beneath them, indifferent to the neighborhood 
of others, indifferent to everything in the world 
except just themselves and their little flirtation. 
Swift could see that the young lady laughed a good 
deal, and that her eyes were bright and her face 
comely ; the youth laughed, too, but showed to less 
advantage. 

Swift apostrophized them mentally on their good 


36 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


fortune and on the infinite power of love that makes 
its children indifferent to the gusts of a March even- 
ing. The man who is in love, or who believes him- 
self to be in love, always feels a tenderness to those 
who are, or seem to be, lovers, and Swift’s heart 
went out towards the pair, even though they did 
look slightly ridiculous, perched there on the windy 
edge of the hill. The only other occupant of the 
place was an old man, who sat somewhat huddled 
up on a bench at the other side of the plateau, and 
who seemed — so Swift thought — to be looking wist- 
fully down upon the realms of smoke below. There 
was an obvious sermon, and, of course. Swift 
preached it to himself as he, too, looked down on 
London — the sermon of youth and age, which is so 
trite and so apt. But Swift was not in an abiding 
mood for sermonizing ; his own fortune did not 
move him to melancholy. 

He was glad that he had come to Primrose Hill. 
The scene was worth the digression and the climb. 
There was a charm in the monotony of the sky, in 
the darkness of the park, in the distant and fre- 
quent spires, even in the blocks of brickwork all 
around which passed for houses. A very strong 
wind was blowing lustily, and it cheered Swift’s 
spirits and added to the sense of altitude. Here 
and there in the distance a lamp glowed, but the 
round of the lamp-lighter had scarcely begun, for 


“WILL THIS HUMOR PASS?” 


37 


though it was getting late in the afternoon, it was 
still quite light. 

Swift glanced round him. The old man had got 
up and was shambling down the hill in one direc- 
tion ; the young man and woman were drifting away, \, 
arm in arm, in another direction. Swift had the 
hill-top to himself, almost, indeed, the whole hill, 
for the place seemed to be abandoned, save by an 
occasional and distant park-keeper. Under the in- 
fluence of his new romanticism Swift rejoiced in 
the solitude. The deserted mound was no inap- 
propriate place for passionate musings. He took 
out of his pocket the little bunch of violets, still 
held together by the little golden brooch, and looked 
at them lovingly. He wished that he did but know 
her name, that he might murmur it softly. What 
a fool he had been not to learn at least so much ! 
However, there was no help for it — nothing but 
patience and hope. Swift lifted the bunch of vio- 
lets to his lips and kissed it. As he was about to 
put it back in his pocket he paused to look again 
at the curious device that composed the brooch. 
So occupied, he had not noticed, or had not heeded, 
some approaching footsteps, till they actually 
paused by his side, and a voice spoke in his ear. 

What the voice said was interrogative. 

“ I beg your pardon, but could you kindly tell 


me- 


38 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Before it had got so far in the uncompleted ques- 
tion, Swift, still holding his treasure and trophy in 
his hand, had turned round and faced the speaker. 
He saw a tall, squarely-built, well-set-up man with 
a handsome rubicund face. There was something 
soldierly in his carriage, in his long moustache, in 
the peremptory flash of his bright eyes. Altogether 
he was a pleasing example of the choleric tempera- 
ment. So much Swift had time to notice before 
the question got to the words “ tell me.” 

It never got beyond those words. For suddenly 
the eyes of Swift’s interlocutor fell upon what Swift 
held in his hand. In a second the face changed 
from urbanity to ferocity, the voice from civility to 
fury, and to Swift’s amazement the rubicund gen- 
tleman shouted : 

“ Where the devil did you get that from ? ” 

And as he thus shouted he made a snatch at the 
bunch of violets. But Swift, too quick for him, 
stepped back a pace or two. 

“ What do you mean ? ” he said. He was too 
surprised to be angry, but the composure of his 
reply did not mollify the rubicund gentleman. 

Where did you get that token ? ” he shouted 
again. “ Give it up at once ! I insist upon it ! ” 
Swift felt sure that he had to deal with a mad- 
man. He slipped the bunch of violets into his 
breast-pocket and said nothing, watching the while 


WILL THIS HUMOR PASS ? ” 39 

his antagonist warily. His action increased the 
rubicund gentleman’s fury. 

“ You damned scoundrel ! ” he shouted. “You 
have stolen that token. Give it up — give it up at 
once, I say ! ” 

And, rapidly advancing, the rubicund gentleman 
caught Swift by the collar of his coat with his left 
hand, while in his right he raised his stick threat- 
eningly. 

Swift was habitually a good-tempered man. But 
he was a strong fellow, and in another second he 
had flung the assailant’s hand from his collar. 

“ Hands off ! ” he shouted, as hot now as his an- 
tagonist ; but the antagonist, heedless of the warn- 
ing, rushed at him again, spluttering with rage and 
flourishing his stick with a mischievous fury. So 
Swift, to save himself, planted a blow upon the 
rubicund gentleman’s throat just under his chin, 
with a force that laid him flat immediately. For 
a second the victim lay on the ground, but with 
the fall he had recovered his speech, and he began 
now to vociferate “ Thief, thief ! ” at the top of his 
voice. 

It suddenly came over Swift that he was involved 
in a desperate adventure. He could see that some 
of the park-keepers, attracted by the cries, were 
making their way up the sides of the hill, that the 
loving couple had paused and turned round in 


40 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


amazement, that people seemed to be running to- 
wards him from all points of the compass. 

Troublesome thoughts raced through Swift’s 
mind. He was really in a most unpleasant im- 
broglio. He could not satisfactorily account for 
his possession of the brooch that was evidently 
familiar to his fallen foe. Even if his strange 
story were to be believed, he could not tell that he 
might not be involving the fair unknown in some 
predicament, that he might not cause her displeas- 
ure, and so deprive himself of his hope of seeing 
her again. In one desperate moment he seemed 
to have weighed all the arguments of the case, and 
to have decided that the best way out of the bad 
business was to run for it. 

He turned sharply round and began to run down 
the slope of the hill as fast as he could in the di- 
rection of the gate that opened on to the road lead- 
ing to Camden Town. His assailant was up and 
after him immediately, shouting “ Stop thief ! ” a 
cry that was hotly taken up by the park-keepers 
and by all the loungers in the place, now roused 
to animation by the savage desire to hunt some- 
thing latent in man. Luckily for Swift, his ene- 
mies were all behind him ; luckily for Swift, his 
old running powers had not abandoned him, 
though they were a thought rusted from want of 


use. 


“WILL THIS HUMOR PASS?” 


41 


He sped down the side of the hill like a hare. 
In his course he passed by the pair of lovers 
whom he had first noted on the hill. Obedient to 
the cries of “ Stop thief ! ” the youth left for a 
moment the side of his companion and stepped 
forward as if to arrest Swift’s flight. But the 
sight of Swift’s athletic form made the youth think 
better of it. He drew back with a weak laugh, 
and in a moment Swift had left him far behind. 
As he ran, Swift was glad that the lad had not tried 
to stop him, for he did not look as if he could bear 
a tumble as well as Swift’s original enemy, and, 
moreover, in his new tenderness for sentimentality 
Swift would have been sorry to humiliate a lover 
before his lass. 

In a few seconds he had reached the lower gate, 
and glanced back as he swung it open. His pur- 
suers were sweeping up hotly, the red-faced gen- 
tleman well ahead, and only distant now a few 
yards from Swift. The alarm caused by the cries 
had spread, and people in the roads around and 
outside tl#e hill had taken up the cry, and were 
running, from all directions to the scene of confu- 
sion. It did not take Swift a second to see all this 
as he dashed into the road. 

His appearance was immediately hailed with a 
shout by certain of the passers-by, and one man of 
the type that loafs around public-house doors tried 


42 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


to trip up Swift as he passed. All he got for his 
pains was to be felled to the earth by a smart side 
stroke, for Swift was losing his temper now, and 
determined not to be caught. The way lay clear 
before him, and he ran as for dear life, with the 
crowd increasing behind him and the volume of 
clamor swelling instantly. 

There were two points in Swift's favor ; firstly, 
that the neighborhood he was in was not a very 
crowded neighborhood ; secondly, that the even- 
ing light was waning. Swift swung sharply off into 
a side street, put on a fresh spurt, and was well 
down a third turning before his pursuers had turned 
into the road he had just quitted. 

Swift had got his second breath and felt, for the 
moment and fallaciously, as if he could go on for 
ever. He twisted into side street after side street, 
hearing the shouts behind him grow fainter and 
more uncertain as he sped. It was a lonely part 
of London where he found himself, and the pur- 
suit did not arouse it greatly. Swift was almost 
thinking that he might slacken speed 'and take 
things easily, when he heard the noise reviving from 
one of the streets to his right, and he saw a police- 
man at a distant corner, stimulated by the sounds 
and catching sight of his flying figure, draw his 
truncheon and start in pursuit. 

Swift gave a groan of despair. Want of practice 


WILL THIS HUMOR PASS ? ” 


43 


was telling upon him. If the policeman came up 
with him ^he would have to surrender. He turned 
down another small street, and from that again into 
a still smaller street, which seemed to conduct into 
a dingy crescent. 

A corner house near the crescent had a deep 
porch that stood sideways to the side-street, and 
tempted him with its possibility of shelter. Per- 
haps if he crouched in there he might not be seen. 
At least, it was worth trying, for he was dead-beat 
and could run no farther. In a moment he had 
bounded up the half-dozen of dirty steps, and flung 
himself, panting, against the door. 

To his extreme surprise, it seemed to yield to his 
weight, and he staggered heavily backwards into 
darkness, while the door, which had thus aided 
him, swung back again and shut to with a click, 
leaving him in total darkness. Confused by the 
suddenness of the event. Swift sank to his knees. 
As he did so he heard the roar and clatter of the 
chase go by and die away into silence. 


CHAPTER IV. 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 

“Will you love me ? ” says he ; 

“ Will you love me ? ” says she. 

Then they answered together, 

‘ ‘ Through foul and fair weather, 

From sunrise to moonrise. 

From moonrise to sunrise, 

By heath and by harbor, 

In orchard or arbor. 

In the time of the rose. 

In the time of the snows. 

Through smoke and through smother, 

We’ll love one another.” 

A Pastoral in Pink, 

E ven those who know London well — or who 
think that they know London well — are 
continually experiencing surprises. No 
one, indeed, knows London ; a few know it some- 
what better than others, but the man who should 
attempt to learn every page of London’s great 
book by root of heart, attempts, in his madness, 
the impossible. 

But those who have studied a little deeper than 
their fellows, and may boast a superficial acquaint- 


44 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


45 


ance with the main lines of its map, often come 
upon sunny spots of greenery for whose existence 
they were wholly unprepared. In the most unlikely 
quarters it sometimes happens that the idle adven- 
turer may chance upon a nook that can boast of se- 
clusion in the heart of populous surroundings, and 
of beauty in the midst of ugliness. 

Such a nook it had been the fortune of the Win- 
dovers to find. Camden Town is, perhaps, as un- 
attractive a region as London can produce. But 
the Windovers in their early married days, drifting 
about in the monotony of its streets, made their 
way into a backwater, and found there a pretty 
house and a pretty garden going together for a 
moderate rent. The house had been built by Harry 
Chandos, the painter, who had given it up after his 
marriage with Dorothea Perceval. It had a studio, 
therefore, and this fact rendered it especially at- 
tractive in the eyes of Mr. Windover, though Mr. 
Windover’s personal associations with the painter’s 
art were limited to occasionally staining a floor or 
enamelling a bookcase. But it was one of An- 
thony Windover’s theories — that a studio was one 
of the most habitable of habitations, the most de- 
lightful work-room and play-room imaginable. 

“ Where,” he would say to Lucilla — “where do 
you get so much light, so much air, so much room 
to turn round in, as in a studio ? Where else can 


46 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


you find conditions and associations so helpful to 
work, so soothing to repose ? 

To which Lucilla would always answer : “ Where, 
indeed ? ” 

So the Windovers were very proud of their big 
studio, and of their little house and of their roomy 
garden with its high red wall. 

Lucilla, for her part, had never liked any house so 
well since she had said good-bye to her last doll’s- 
house, not so very many years ago. Indeed, both 
he and she treated it as if it were a kind of doll’s- 
house, and were never as happy as when they were 
doing something to it, putting up a picture here or 
arranging a corner there, or reconstructing their 
little library on an entirely new plan, which endured 
for a week, and then was abandoned for a different 
system, which also had its little day and ceased to 
be. 

The Windovers were very young. Swift had 
once said of them to Stephen Budget that they 
ought to be called the “ boy and girl,” and Budget 
adopted the nomenclature, and never called them 
anything else. As far as Budget could be said to 
like anybody except himself, he liked the Win- 
dovers. He used to say that it was as restful as a 
day in the country to spend an evening with them. 
But, then, it must be remembered that Lucilla was 
an excellent housekeeper, with an excellent cook ; 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


47 


that between Lucilla and the cook excellent little 
dinners came into existence ; and that Windover 
had a judicious palate and a good cellar. 

Windover was indeed, in the eyes of his friends, 
and in his own eyes, a fortunate man. He was a 
successful journalist, of that order of journalists 
who address to their calling a devotion and an 
earnestness that raise it to the dignity of an art. 
His scholarship, his reading, the slightly labored 
grace of his style, the optimism which he borrowed 
from the greatest of the Latins, from the greatest 
of the Germans, had won him a special place in 
the journalism of his day. If some of his critics 
found his optimism old-fashioned, if they objected 
to the gravity with which he invested so slight a 
matter as the writing of a leading article, the re- 
viewing of a passing book, these qualities had nev- 
ertheless given him while he was still well under 
forty, an influence which he never abused. When 
he wrote on politics, when he wrote on literature, * 
he sought .always for the golden mean ; he declared 
that he belonged to no party in the State, but to 
the State itself, that he belonged to no school in 
literature, but to literature. It was in The Arbiter^ 
the weekly journal which he now edited, that he 
had first expressed the political opinions which 
won him the admiration of the Imperialist party ; 
it was, curiously enough, in the columns of a Radi- 


48 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


cal paper that his earliest essays on literature and 
art appeared and guided so many minds. Win- 
dover was grateful to journalism for what it had 
done for him ; most grateful it had enabled him 
to marry Lucilla. 

Lucilla Windover could do many things well, 
but there was one thing she could do better than 
all the rest — she could laugh. She had a passion 
for laughter and a genius for laughing. She knew 
her disposition and laughed at it. “ A star danced 
when I was born,” she would say with Beatrice. 
But her laughter was never prompted by malice or 
jogged by mockery. She did not, as many do, ex- 
cuse the cruelty of laughter by the assertion of an 
extreme sense of the ludicrous. Her laughter was 
part of the enduring youthfulness of her character, 
the youthfulness that kept her a child while she 
was a wife, the youthfulness that would keep her 
young in spite of years. 

Luckily for Lucilla’s spirits, her husband liked 
laughter, too. His laughter was quieter .than hers, 
but it always responded to her impulse. There 
were persons who found the Windovers provokingly 
young, provokingly merry. A man who had any 
share in directing public opinion ought not in their 
judgment to carry himself, or to allow his wife to 
carry herself, so lightly. To such criticism Win- 
dover and his wife were indifferent. It was his 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


49 


conviction that public affairs would be none the 
worse for a little more geniality, and as for Lucilla, 
those who knew her well knew that there was no 
woman who could be more serious when to be seri- 
ous was peremptory. 

Men of letters do not always show to best advan- 
tage in the married state, and women have not al- 
ways rejoiced after wedding them. But Windover 
did not make too much of his business in life, nor 
Lucilla too little. His desk was not a rack which 
he only quitted to be crippled physically and men- 
tally for the rest of the day. Writing came to him 
easily and gave him pleasure, but he had the happy 
faculty when he ceased writing of ceasing to be a 
writer, if not altogether, at least to an unusual and 
admirable degree. In Lucilla he had a companion 
of an intelligence quite equal to his own, rich in 
the sympathy and the affection that made adapta- 
bility to his moods easy in the rare cases when his 
moods made a demand for adaptability on her part. 
She was quite ten years younger than he, which 
she always insisted to be the proper difference m 
the ages of husband and wife. They had been 
married now for five years and had been engaged 
for nearly three years before their fortunes allowed 
them to marry. They said of themselves that they 
would have made an excellent brother and sister 
if they had not been lucky enough to make a still 

4 


50 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE.- 


more excellent husband and wife. The very fact 
that they had no children only seemed to lend an 
additional air of youth to their domesticity. 

On the afternoon of the day that had seemed to 
dawn so auspiciously for Swift, the Windovers were 
sitting together in the studio, one at each side of 
the hearth, that recalled the hospitality of old-fash- 
ioned fireplaces. Windover was reading the latest 
production of the Scandinavian drama ; Lucilla 
was absorbed in a volume of fairy stories. Both 
felt content with themselves, with their studies, 
with the warmth of the fire, with the brightness of 
the light that came through the studio windows, 
with the world in general. 

Their content was interrupted by the entrance 
of the maid. Mr. Windover made a protesting ges- 
ture as the maid brought a card, not to his wife, 
but to him. 

Then he took up the card, and read out the 
name upon it : 

“ ‘ Lieutenant-Colonel Amadis Rockielaw. ’ ” 
‘Lucilla laid down her book. 

“ Who is Colonel Rockielaw ? ” she asked. “ The 
gentleman rejoices in a rare name.” 

Mr. Windover shrugged his shoulders. 

“ He distinguished himself in the Soudan and 
the Nile Valley. I met him at the club the other 
day : he burns to reform in England some politico- 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


51 


military way. Wish he hadn’t come quite so 
early.” 

“ Let me stop and see him,” said Lucilla. 

Windover answered, “ By all means,” and told 
the maid to ask Colonel Rockielaw into the studio. 

Lucilla rose to her feet with some curiosity 
when the maid announced Colonel Rockielaw. 
Colonel Rockielaw was a tall, handsome man, who 
was probably nearer to fifty-five than to fifty, largely 
built, broad-chested, with a florid face that sug- 
gested good fellowship, a choleric disposition, and 
the sanguine temperament. He was coming rap- 
idly into the room with his hand extended to Win- 
dover, when he saw Lucilla standing by the fire- 
place, whereupon he came to a halt and bowed 
solemnly. 

Windover hastened forward. 

“ My wife. Colonel Rockielaw. Lucilla, let me 
present to you Colonel Rockielaw, whose conduct 
in the Soudan makes him no stranger to any Eng- 
lishwoman.” 

Colonel Rockielaw’s face wore a warmer tint for 
a moment as he took Lucilla’s hand, and murmured 
something to the effect that Windover was too 
good, in a tone that suggested that exploits in the 
Far East were of no greater moment than a walk 
in Camden Town. Then he grasped Windover’s 
hand warmly. He spoke with exuberance : 


52 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Delighted to find you in, my dear Windover — 
delighted ! You see, I took you at your word.” 

Windover had a vague idea that in the course of 
a smoking-room conversation Colonel Rockielaw 
had expressed a wish to pursue the talk further on 
some future occasion, and that he had asked for 
Windover’s address. He motioned the Colonel 
towards a chair. Lucilla moved towards the door. 

“ No doubt you have business with my husband. 

Colonel Rockielaw she was beginning ; but 

before she could finish her sentence Colonel 
Rockielaw bounded up from his chair and placed 
himself between her and the door. 

“ Pray don’t go, my dear madam,” he said. “ In- 
deed, the little matter which I wish to speak to our 
friend Windover about is a matter upon which the 
opinion of such a woman as yourself will be most 
welcome. Let me beg of you ” 

Thus entreated, Lucilla returned to her arm- 
chair ; Windover dropped back into his own seat ; 
and the Colonel, seating himself between them, 
looked from one to the other for a few seconds 
without speaking. 

The silence was for a moment slightly embar- 
rassing to the husband and wife, who were won- 
dering what the meaning of the Colonel’s visit 
might be. But Colonel Rockielaw did not appear 
to be in the least embarrassed. His silence was 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


53 




not due to shyness, but to a military instinct which 
led him to survey a situation before attacking it. 
So he looked alternately at Lucilla and at Win- 
dover, while he slowly revolved in his mind what 
he had come to say and how he should say it. 

In the meantime husband and wife surveyed 
their visitor with slightly different feelings. Win- 
dover looked at him with a sense of amusement at 
his oddness which was not untempered by the 
envy with which the man of books always regards 
the man of action. Windover was a far cleverer 
man than Rockielaw, and he could smile at Rockie- 
law’s wild ideas and clumsy phrases ; but the smile 
was not quite whole-hearted as he thought of all 
the things that Rockielaw had done while he lay at 
home at ease. And so if he smiled, he also sighed. 

Lucilla felt no such divided feeling. She re- 
membered now reading of gallant things done by 
Rockielaw in India and Egypt, and she liked him 
for that and because all women like soldiers, and 
she thought that he loomed a heroic figure in their 
studio. ^ 

Such as he was, Colonel Rockielaw carried the 
camp into the Windovers’ studio, and in doing so 
delighted the Windovers beyond expression. But 
even now while he occupied their cosiest armchair 
and beleaguered their hearth, he was diffident as to 
the purpose of his visit. 


54 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Look here, Windover,” he said at last, “ look 
here, Windover, you are a man of sense, you 
know.” 

Windover said that he hoped so, that he even 
believed so. 

“ And it is just in this crisis that men of sense 
are most needed for the cause,” the Colonel con- 
tinued. 

“ What crisis ? ” asked Windover ; “ and what 
cause ? ” 

“ The crisis that we are passing through,” the 
Colonel explained ; “ the cause that we have all at 
heart. England is in peril.” 

“ Is she ? ” Windover asked dryly, while Lucilla 
looked from Colonel Rockielaw to her husband 
and wondered what the peril could be which ex- 
cited the one so much and seemed to interest the 
other so little. 

“ Indeed she is ! ” said Colonel Rockielaw em- 
phatically. “ Never more so. Both the great par- 
ties are supine, sir — supine. We want new ideas — 
we want new men, men like Charles James Pitt ” 

“ William Pitt,” Windover interpolated gently. 

“ Quite so — William Pitt. You have heard of 
the Sylphs ? ” 

“ The Sylphs ?” Windover interrogated. 

“Yes, you know — those creatures whom Dryden 
speaks of : 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


55 


“ ‘ Know, then, unnumbered spirits round thee fly, 

The light militia of the upper sky.’ ” 

“ Ah, you are quoting Pope,” said Windover. 

“ Am I ? ” said Colonel Rockielaw. Pope or 
Dryden, Dryden or Pope, it ’s all the same sort of 
thing. But whoever the fellow was, he was speak- 
ing of Sylphs. I am a Sylph.” 

Colonel Rockielaw looked so particularly large 
and solid as he made this announcement that Lucilla 
looked at him with a sudden fear that their visitor 
was out of his senses. But as she glanced at her 
husband she felt relieved, for Windover did not 
look in the least alarmed. In fact, it was just be- 
ginning to dawn upon him that he knew what Colo- 
nel Rockielaw was driving at. 

“ Ah ! ” he said ; “ so you are a Sylph, are you ?” 

“Yes,” Colonel Rockielaw said proudly, “I am 
a Sylph. And let me tell you, Windover, the Sylphs 
mean to save England, or they will know the rea- 
son why ! ” 

Anthony had it upon the tip of his tongue to say 
that it was very good of the Sylphs to have the 
interests of England so nearly at heart, but he con- 
tented himself with smiling an amiable assent. 

“ You have heard of the Sylphs ? ” Colonel 
Rockielaw went on. “ You have heard of them, of 
course ? ” 

Windover admitted that he had heard of them. 


56 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Then,” said Colonel Rockielaw, “of course you 
have heard of Dorothy Carteret — pf Miss Dorothy 
Carteret ? ” 

Windover had heard of Miss Carteret and ad- 
mitted as much. 

“ Miss Dorothy Carteret,” said Colonel Rockie- 
law, “ is the greatest woman — I might even say the 
greatest man — in England.” 

Curiosity spurred Lucilla to speak. 

“ Who is Dorothy Carteret ? ” she asked. 

Colonel Rockielaw turned his face towards Lu- 
cilla. His eyes shone, his cheeks seemed to wear 
a warmer tint. 

“Ah!” he said, “Dorothy Carteret defies de- 
scription.” 

“ Is n’t she Lord Godolphin’s daughter ? ” asked 
Windover, who piqued himself upon an observer’s 
knowledge of the world. 

“ Yes,” said Colonel Rockielaw. “ Yes, but that 
is of no consequence. Miss Carteret is the Spirit 
of the Age ! ” 

“ Do you know,” Lucilla said, and her voice, to 
her husband’s ear, was charged with latent laughter, 
“ I do not think that I am much wiser than before. 
Why is Lord Godolphin’s daughter the Spirit of 
the Age ? ” 

“You take a poor soldier at an advantage,” 
Rockielaw answered. “ If I were Windover, now, 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


57 


I might paint her portrait for you in living words. 
That ’s not my business, and I boggle in it.” 

“ Miss Carteret,” said Windover, coming to his 
guest’s assistance, “ is a young lady of very ad- 
vanced ideas. She is not an ‘ end of the century ’ 
girl; she belongs, as I am given to understand, to the 
next century, and more to its meridian than itsdawn.” 

“ Neither of you help me much,” Lucilla pro- 
tested. “ Between you both, the Man of the Robe 
and the Man of the Sword, I can only learn generali- 
ties. Be particular, please. Colonel Rockielaw.” 

Colonel Rockielaw smiled at the gentle malice 
of Lucilla’s manner. Windover slightly winced at 
being called a Man of the Robe. In his heart he 
always thought that he had been intended for 
adventure, and insistence upon his place in life 
sometimes galled him. 

“ My dear Mrs. Windover,” said Rockielaw, “ I 
will do my best to obey you. Miss Carteret is a 
very original young woman. She has very advanced 
ideas, but they are all in the right direction. In a 
tolerably wide experience of the world I have never 
seen anybody like her.” Colonel Rockielaw was 
going to say “ in a tolerably wide experience of 
women,” but changed his mind and said “the 
world ” instead, in deference to Lucilla, who looked 
so young. “ She has a great deal of influence, both 
upon men of thought and men of action, and her 


58 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


influence ought to be of service to the State. It was 
she who started the Sylphs. And, besides, she is 
very beautiful — very beautiful indeed.” 

“ There we have the mainspring,” said Lucilla. 
“ What is she like ? ” 

“ Ah, my dear madam,” answered Rockielaw, 
“ if I were a poet I might tell you. I will not try 
the impossible, but I can show you her likeness.” 
He drew from his breast-pocket a small leather case, 
which he handed to Lucilla. “ Pray do not sup- 
pose,” he said hurriedly, “ that I am in any way 
specially favored in possessing Miss Carteret’s por- 
trait. That is a privilege accorded to every recog- 
nized Sylph — that and our badge of brotherhood.” 

The case contained a photograph of a girl’s face, 
and the face was, indeed, as the soldier had said, 
very beautiful. 

“ She is lovely,” said Lucilla, rapturously ; “ and 
she seems quite young. She is dark-haired, is she 
not ? ” 

Colonel Rockielaw was delighted at Mrs. Win- 
dover’s enthusiasm for his idol. 

“Yes,” he said, “she is dark, divinely dark; 
sable hair, azure eyes. And she is young — little 
more than four-and-twenty.” 

“May I see this nonpareil of women?” Win- 
dover asked. He looked at the portrait, and was 
as delighted as his wife. 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


59 


“ It is happiness to be a Sylph,” he exclaimed, if 
Sylphs are blessed with such talismans. How is 
common man exalted to Sylphdom ? ” 

He handed back the portrait to Rockielaw, who 
looked tenderly at it and put it back again into his 
pocket. 

“ Why, you see,” he said, “ that is the very thing 
I wanted to talk to you about.” 

“ Do you want me to become a Sylph ? ” Win- 
dover asked, laughing, and as Rockielaw did not 
immediately answer, Lucilla put in a question. 

“ What are the Sylphs, any way ? ” 

“ The Sylphs,” said the Colonel, “ are an associ- 
ation of persons — many of them distinguished ; 
some, like your humble servant, quite undistin- 
guished and unknown — whose purpose is to give 
pleasure to Miss Carteret, whose very loyal vassals 
we are, and, in the main, to breathe a rarer air 
than that of the average man, the average woman. 
From this finer ether we, as we flatter ourselves, 
are enabled to see more clearly than most what is 
likely to be good for society and for the State.” 

Windover coughed, and said nothing. 

Lucilla said, “ How very interesting ! ” and the 
corners of her lips twitched a little. 

The Colonel resumed his harangue. 

‘‘ Oh, I assure you that we have a good deal of 
influence. What was begun as a sort of intellectual 


6o 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


pastime has developed almost into a philosophy. 
You see we number statesmen amongst Miss Car- 
teret’s disciples, men whose hands are on the pulse 
of empire.” 

Colonel Rockielaw was evidently well pleased 
with this last phrase, for he repeated it and then 
paused. 

Windover felt that he was expected to say some- 
thing. He said it : 

“Very remarkable indeed.” 

What he was thinking was that this honest sol- 
dier, with his parroted philosophy, his parroted 
phrases, was a sufficiently absurd figure, and that 
Miss Carteret must be an exceedingly trying kind 
of young woman. 

“ Now,” said Colonel Rockielaw, “ I suppose you 
begin to understand what has brought me here ? ” 

Windover shook his head. 

“ At the risk of being considered exceptionally 
dense,” he answered, “ I must confess that I am 
still in the dark.” 

“ I will illuminate the darkness,” said Colonel 
Rockielaw. “ Have you ever thought of the House 
of Commons ? ” 

“ What do you mean ? ” Windover answered : 
“ How can a poor journalist help thinking about the 
House of Commons ?” 

“ Ah,” said Colonel Rockielaw, “ but I mean 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


6l 


more particularly — I mean for yourself. Have 
you ever thought of entering the House of Com- 
mons ? ” 

‘‘ I suppose,” Windover answered slowly, “ that 
every man who has taken any interest in public’ 
affairs has some time or other felt a wish to be in 
the House of Commons. It is almost inevitable ; 
it is, perhaps, in some regards, admirable. But 
what of that, so far as I am concerned ? ” 

“ I am,” Colonel Rockielaw said, “ as it were, 
an ambassador. I am here to sound you. If you 
would like to come into the House of Commons, I 
think I can assure you that the thing is to be done.” 

Windover drew a deep breath. 

“ I do not fully understand,” he said. 

He was wondering whether his visitor had really 
any such influence as his words seemed to suggest ; 
he was wondering what Lucilla would think of the 
proposal and of the possibilities it implied. He 
did not look at his wife, but kept his eyes fixed on 
the face of Colonel Rockielaw. 

“ The matter is very simple,” said Rockielaw. 
‘‘We are, as it were, a new party in the State. We 
want to have our man in the House of Commons — 
the man who looks at England with our eyes, who 
speaks for England with our voice. It has occurred 
to us, Windover, that you are that man.” 

“ A mere mouthpiece,” Windover said, more to 


62 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


himself than to Rockielaw. But Rockielaw caught 
the words briskly. 

“ Not at all,” he said — “ not at all ; nothing of 
the kind — far from it. What I meant was that you 
seem, among our publicists, to be the man who most 
fully would understand our views, and who would 
give them their best expression. But our great 
need is for an independent man, who would prompt, 
spur, inspire ; who would urge forward the adven- 
turous ; who would animate the sluggish. Don’t 
you feel that you could play such a part ? ” 

Windover felt sure that though the voice was the 
voice of Rockielaw, the words were the words of 
somebody else — in all probability the words of 
Dorothy Carteret. 

“ This is unexpected,” he murmured. “ Now, 
why not you yourself, for instance ? ” 

Lucilla, who was looking alternately from her 
husband’s face to the face of the visitor, thought 
that she detected a shadow of dissatisfaction on 
Rockielaw’s fac^ as if that idea had occurred to 
him, and had not been encouraged. But any such 
expression, if it existed at all, was fleeting. He re- 
plied with decision : 

“ I,” he said — “ I ? Oh dear no ! I am a man 
of action — at least, I mean, a man of a different 
sort of action. I should rust at Westminster. In- 
deed, I think that one rusts in Europe.” 


LOVE IN A VILLA. 


63 


“You want wild continents,” said Windover, with 
a smile. “ For me Westminster would seem the 
tented field. But surely there is no vacancy at 
present.” 

“ There will be,” said Rockielaw. “ Loudenhall 
is going to resign. He is ordered abroad. His life 
depends upon it.” 

“ I am very sorry,” said Windover, who had 
noted Loudenhall’s short Parliamentary career, 
and had liked his gifts. 

“ So am I,” said Rockielaw in that composed 
tone which soldiers get to assume towards all the 
vicissitudes of the world. “ But that ’s how it is, 
and the question is, how do you feel about filling 
the gap in the ranks ? ” 

“ It is somewhat sudden,” Windover said. “ Is 
the seat a safe seat ? ” 

“ Safe as a church,” said Rockielaw cheerily. 
“ The Pine Hill Division is as safe a seat for our 
side as if it were a pocket-borough. Really, it is 
at your disposal.” 

“ If this is a serious offer,” Windover said, “ it 
must be taken seriously. You will see very well, 
Colonel Rockielaw, that the consideration of such 
a proposal requires time.” 

“ Of course, of course,” Colonel Rockielaw as- 
sented heartily. “The resignation will not take 
place for some months to come. But we want our 


64 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


man to be ready, and we want, if possible, you to 
be the man. How much time will you want to 
make up your mind in ? ” 

“ Not very much time,” said Windover ; “ proba- 
bly only a day or two.” 

“ Thank you ! ” said Colonel Rockielaw. “ Drop 
me a line to the club — to the Army and Navy,” he 
added, remembering that to Windover, as a civil- 
ian, the words “ the club ” would probably have a 
very different suggestion, something stolid, like the 
Reform, or solid, like the Athenaeum. 

Then Colonel Rockielaw grasped the Windovers’ 
hands with warmth, and retired in good order. 

Husband and wife, left alone, stood as they were 
till they heard the door shut. Then they turned 
and looked at each other. 

“ Well ? ” said Lucilla. 

“ Well ? ” said Anthony. 


CHAPTER V. 


INTHEHOUSE. 

It is, methinks, a mystery of Nature, 

That she can make such marvels, green and gold. 

The color of God’s carpet, and the hue 
Of heaven’s stars, God’s candles, yet so foul 
For all their fairness. 

The Devil's Comedy. 

W HEN the providential door had closed be- 
hind Swift he found himself in total 
darkness. The quarry had found shelter 
indeed, but the question now came, Where had he 
found shelter ? He could see nothing ; the dark- 
ness which enveloped him was complete, a darkness 
to which his eyes did not grow accustomed. But 
his sense of hearing, quickened by the predicament, 
seemed to catch some sounds in his neighborhood, 
faint stealthy sounds which stirred his attention for 
an instant and then dwindled into silence. Swift 
felt in his pocket for his match-box, and struck a 
light. 

What he saw seemed so terrible that as he saw it 
he gave a! wild scream ; the match dropped from 
his fingers, burying him once again in darkness, 
5 65 


66 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


and he reeled in an agony of alarm back against 
the door. 

That brief illumination had shown to him at the 
first flash a dingy kind of hall or passage in which 
he stood. As the tiny light grew stronger he saw 
that the passage ended a few feet from him in a 
flight of stairs which went straight up to a rest- 
ing-place, and then seemed to turn sharply back 
and continue its ascent to the upper part of the 
house. But at the same moment he saw something 
so startling, so unexpected, that sheer panic had 
conquered him. 

For the place appeared to his startled senses to 
be alive with snakes. Down the length of the first 
flight of stairs a huge serpent stretched itself and 
lifted its evil head to gaze at the light. From be- 
tween the railings of the balustrade above boa-con- 
strictors hung, their bodies looped and festooned 
between the bars of that dingy stairway as he had 
so often seen tl^m in pictures looped and festooned 
from the giant branches of some tropical forest. 
For one instant of anguish he saw all this, saw a 
quantity of eyes shining like jewels as the creatures 
turned their heads towards the intruder and the 
light, and then the light fell, and Swift stood in the 
darkness frenzied with horror, frenzied with fear. 

What was he to do ? In the confusion of his 
senses he found himself wondering if he had indeed 


IN THE HOUSE. 


67 


seen what he thought he had seen, or if his over- 
strained nerves had played him some trick, giving 
fearful shapes to ordinary shadows in that dim 
place. Yet another second left Swift helplessly 
alone with the damning certainty that he had seen 
what he had seen. 

Into what horrible place had chance led him ? 
He groped frantically for the handle of the door 
which had so insidiously shielded him from one 
danger only to leave him helpless before a danger 
surpassingly greater. He groped in vain. He could 
find no handle anywhere, could not even find any 
division line in the smooth surface against which he 
leaned to show him where the outline of the door 
was. He felt that he was caught like a rat in a 
trap, that he would have to fight aimlessly, hope- 
lessly, in the dark during a few horrible moments 
for a life that would soon be snatched away from 
him by terrible antagonists. 

Though it was not three seconds since the mo- 
ment when he had dropped the match, he felt as 
if he had stood there at bay for hours. The air 
seemed to be full of creeping movements. When 
would he feel the first touch ? The agony of the 
thought thawed the silence into which fear had 
frozen him, and a cry broke from his lips. It sounded 
hollowly, but it served to break the spell which had 
fallen upon him. Desperate, he would at least do 


68 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


all he could. In the darkness his voice rang out 
again and yet again, shrieking for help. And im- 
mediately help came. 

A gleam of light flashed in the upper part of the 
house, a gleam which increased into a glow as 
some one descended the higher flight carrying a 
lamp. He could scarcely hear the softly-falling 
footsteps, but he could hear that some human voice 
was gently humming or half singing a strange tune. 
By the flicker of the descending light Swift seemed 
to see fine, undulating shadows disappearing in its 
direction, but when the light became more pro- 
nounced, there was no sign of the creatures whose 
aspect had palsied his energies. 

The croon of the strange song ceased. A voice 
called out from above, “ Who is there ? " and Swift 
tried to answer, but the strain and the relief to- 
gether proved too much for him, and with a sob he 
dropj^d in a dead faint on the floor. 

When Swift recovered his senses he found him- 
self in a remarkable room. For a moment he 
wondered if he was still awake — if he had not slipped 
into some dream of the Arabian Nights. For the 
room was an Oriental room, a room that might 
have been in Damascus or Bagdad. £)utside its walls 
should be the yellow desert or the yellow Tigris, not 
the squalid London streets, not the dinginess of 
Camden Town. A divan ran around the room, a 


IN THE HOUSE. 


69 


divan of rich dark stuff. Upon that divan Swift was 
now resting. The window above his head was closely 
latticed with Arabian woodwork ; one division of it 
was unlatched and open, letting in the cold air and 
the waning light. On a low table a small lamp \ 
burned, shedding a faint gleam upon an open manu- 
script covered with Oriental characters. By the faint 
light Swift could see that the walls were hung with 
curtains dyed and patterned in the Arabian fashion, 
and that many were richly embroidered with the 
curving and interlacing inscriptions of Eastern 
writing in great gold characters. In one corner 
shone a confusion of things of price — weapons, 
stuffs, jars, bottles, vases and plates in precious 
porcelain, in scarcely less precious bronze. 

Swift’s wondering gaze returned from the room 
to its owner, whose dress, as he now noted, had 
something of the Oriental character about it. The 
man was rather short and extremely thin, and the 
color of his skin was brown, almost like mahogany. 
In curious contrast to the hue of his complexion, 
his hair was of a gray that was almost entirely 
white, and his long thin beard and long moustaches 
were of the same color. His eyes were very bright 
and keen, but their brightness and keeness painfully 
suggested the eyes of snakes to Swift, and he shud- 
dered. The man’s grave, bronzed face looked 
down at Swift with not unkindly interest. 


70 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ The snakes,” Swift said. “ There were snakes ? ” 

His host smiled. 

Oh yes ! ” he answered. “ There certainly were 
snakes. But they are quite tame. You shall see 
them if you will. I have but to call on this whistle 
and they will answer my summons.” 

Swift shook his head. 

“No, thank you. I am not curious. One such 
sight was enough for me — at present,” he added 
somewhat hurriedly, as if too ostentatious a dislike 
to the horrible pets might pain or irritate the mys- 
terious being in whose power for the moment he 
seemed to be. 

His host did not seem, however, to be either of- 
fended or annoyed. 

“ Inshallah,” he said. “ As you please. But 
they are harmless and they are obedient, which 
is more than can be said of most human beings, 
and they are certainly more agreeable companions 
than most human beings, so far as my poor experi- 
ence teaches me.” 

Swift rose to his feet. 

“ I ought to be going,” he said. “ I feel quite 
recovered. I am exceedingly obliged to you for 
your kindness, and I feel that I ought to apologize 
to you for my intrusion.” 

The man shook his head. 

“ It is a proverb,” he said gravely, “ that the 


IN THE HOUSE. 


71 


guest is always welcome. You are quite well 
enough, however, to go ; and there is another 
proverb which says that there is little grace in de- 
laying the traveller.’* 

There was something impressive. Swift thought, 
in the self-possessed courtesy of his host. That 
courtesy tempted him to an indiscretion. 

“ Might I ask,” he said, before I go, why you 
keep these creatures ? ” 

The man frowned slightly. 

“ You will have observed,” he said, “ that I have 
asked you no question as to why you came here. 
The discretion that a host owes to an unexpected 
guest is due also to the host from the guest. But 
there is no mystery in the matter. I am a snake- 
charmer, and I come to England to show my 
skill.” 

Swift blushed slightly at the reproof. It was 
gently uttered, but it made him feel that he had 
been indiscreet, and he hastened to offer an apol- 
ogy which his host with grave courtesy waived 
aside. 

He took up the light and led the way to the 
door, which was hidden by a heavy Eastern cur- 
tain. He went slowly down the stairs, and Swift 
followed him wondering. 

In the dingy hall the naked light was still burn- 
ing, and Swift felt as if he had stepped out of fairy 


72 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


land. But there was still a note of surprise ; the 
romance of the adventure was not all exhausted. 

As the man paused and set down the lamp in a 
niche in the hall, Swift felt something almost like 
regret at parting from the strange man and the 
strange house. 

“ I am very grateful to you,” he said, “for your 
kindness to me — for your courteous reception of 
an unwelcome intrusion, an unwarrantable intru- 
der. Circumstances of a very peculiar and un- 
pleasant kind forced me to take shelter in your 
doorway. I presume your door must have been 
ajar, for it gave way before me, and I entered, as 
it were, against my will.” 

“ My door was not ajar,” the snake-charmer said 
with a smile. “ It is so constructed that it immedi- 
ately yields to pressure from without.” 

Swift could see now that there was apparently 
no handle to the door, no bolt, no sign of any kind 
of lock. It was no wonder that he was not able to 
get out in the moment of his first alarm. 

“You are puzzled by my door,” said the man. 
“You are wondering how it opens. It is very sim- 
ple — a spring. See ! ” 

He pressed his thumb upon a place in the door 
considerably higher than where the handle would 
ordinarily be. The door immediately began to 
yield and move inwards. The snake-charmer 


IN THE HOUSE. 


73 


pushed it back again, and it shut with the sharp 
click that Swift remembered when it had first 
closed behind him. 

“ You have heard of Professor Petrus ? ” said the 
snake-charmer. 

Swift nodded. He had often heard of the ec- 
centric old Orientalist who was said by the credu- 
lous to have the elixir of long life. 

“ This house belongs to him,” said the snake- 
charmer. “ I met him in India, and I told him I 
was coming to London. I had done him some 
poor services, and he was good and lent me his 
home. This door was done to his fancy. You 
see it is very simple. It serves my purposes well. 
I wish you farewell and the peace of God.” 

“ I hope you will not consider me indiscreet 
again,” Swift said hurriedly ; “but if I may say so 
without presumption, you interest me very much, 
and I should like to believe that we may meet 
again.” 

By this time all Swift’s horror at the place had 
faded away before his interest in the strange man 
who lived in so strange a way with such strange 
companions, and he was eager to know more about 
him. 

The snake-charmer fixed his keen eyes upon 
Swift’s face. There came for a moment a kind of 
film over their brightness — a film which immedi- 


74 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


ately vanished and seemed to leave them brighter, 
more piercing, than before. 

“You are very kind, Mr. Swift,” he answered 
quietly. 

Swift started. 

“You know my name ?” he said in astonish- 
ment. 

Again the man smiled. 

“ I might earn a reputation for wizardry cheaply,” 
he said,*“ for I could even tell you where you live, 
though I have seldom been in Queen Square, and 
although I never saw you before to-day. But it is 
not much of a mystery, after all. Your book be- 
trayed you.” 

“ My book ! ” Swift slipped his hand into the 
pocket where his companion rested. 

“Yes,” said the man. “When you fell down 
the book dropped from your pocket. I picked it 
up after I had picked you up, and I saw your name 
written in it. There was an envelope between the 
pages which had fluttered out, and on that envelope 
was your address. You see, it needed no study of 
the stars to learn so much. It is simpler than 
snake-charming.” 

Swift laughed. It was a relief in the somewhat 
excited state of his nerves to find what seemed 
to be occult resolve itself into so matter-of-fact an 
explanation. 


IN THE HOUSE. 


75 


“Well,” he said, “chance has given you my 
name. Will you not let deliberation give me 
yours ? ” 

“ I have many names,” said the man — “ many 
names in many places. Here, if you like, I am 
known as Mr. Brass. If we are to meet again, we 
are to meet again. Nothing happens for nothing, 
and I recognize the bond. And now good-night 
and God’s peace.” 

Swift felt his hand firmly clasped, the door swung 
open, he moved forward and the door immediately 
swung behind him. He was standing in a dingy 
Camden Town street. The house he had left 
seemed to have been swallowed up in the common- 
place again. No gleam of light came from it, 
though from the other houses, its neighbors in the 
dismal place, rays of light came cheerfully out 
into the darkness. Above him a few stars were 
shining faintly in the moist sky. 


CHAPTER VI. 


A CABINET COUNCIL. 

I cry you mercy : 

You are the scholar ; I ’m the man of deeds, 

Let me be in this bustle ; give and take 
Challenges, blows ; it is my cue to fight. 

Mine be the battle, be it yours to taste 
Quiet and lettered ease in Padua. 

The Prince of Padtia. 

O N the same afternoon as Colonel Rockielaw, 
and not very long after Colonel Rockie- 
law’s departure, Stephen Budget visited 
^ the Windovers. He visited them frequently, for he 
liked Lucilla, and he would have liked to make 
love to her if there had been the slightest proba- 
bility of her allowing him to do so. Stephen pro- 
fessed, and indeed felt, a contempt for women. 
He affected the artificial cynicism of the heroes of 
eighteenth-century comedy, and posed as a peer 
of the worst and wildest of them all. But Nature 
had not entered very generously into co-operation 
with him to assist him to play the part. 

He was, or had been, good-looking, after a some- 
76 


A CABINET COUNCIL. 


n 


what obvious fashion ; so far Nature had helped 
him out. He was not very tall, but he was well 
made, and his face had its kind of assertive hand- 
someness. But his ruddy hair was often untidy ; 
his russet chin and bull throat were infrequently 
shaved ; his linen was not always clean ; his hands 
were not always clean. His clothes seldom became 
him even when they were new, and they were often 
new, for he had paroxysms of would-be dandyism, 
in which he bought unsuitable garments from un- 
advisable tailors, and paraded himself, the helot 
of ungainliness. He was never neat, never well 
groomed. 

But, in spite of Budget’s defects, Windover and 
his wife tolerated him readily enough, really almost 
liked him. For one thing, Stephen was clever ; 
his admirers called him very clever, and even his 
enemies admitted his ability. He had written 
things in Windover’s paper, clever sketches of 
certain phases of London life, sketches in which 
the insight of the reporter was aided by a showi- 
ness that was almost brilliancy, a showiness that 
became exaggerated when Budget wrote on other 
themes — on themes that needed a more sober treat- 
ment. Stephen had never written on politics for 
Windover’s paper ; he professed revolutionary doc- 
trines. Of late he had written nothing for Win- 
dover, he had drifted into other alliances : he was 


78 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


doing, on the whole, well. Although he was at 
times the victim of an idleness that seemed to eat 
into his resolution like an acid, at other times he 
could show a great power of work, and write and 
write and write with a persistence that amazed 
Windover. 

There was another reason why the Windovers 
had been at first so ready to receive Budget by 
their fireside. Budget in his early London days 
had been very poor indeed, and Windover, when 
he knew him first, knew of this also, and as Win- 
dover — and Lucilla, too, for the matter of that — had 
known what it felt like to be poor, Anthony’s hand 
went out to the brother from Bohemia. Not that 
Budget, to do him justice, thrust his need upon the 
attention of Windover or any one else. He bore 
his poverty with a kind of grim gallantry ; if he 
made a wry face when his stomach pinched, he did 
so with averted head, and met friends and enemies 
with a grin. He dwelt a good deal upon his pov- 
erty in later days, for it made excellent copy and 
enhanced the importance of his subsequent suc- 
cess. He took his revenge upon it in that way ; 
but there had been a time when it came near to 
undoing him altogether. 

Windover helped him in his difficulty, not by 
counsel or example, but by a timely recognition of 
his genuine talent at a moment when he was at the 


A CABINET COUNCIL. 


79 


last grips with his bad fortune. Windover’s house 
was opened to Budget, and Budget was not the kind 
of man to under-estimate his friend’s desire to wel- 
come him as a guest. Windover’s position helped 
to reform him by filling him with a devil of envy 
that was stronger than the devil of laziness. Bud- 
get determined to be respectable because he was 
determined to succeed. 

When Budget entered the studio he promptly 
dropped into a vacant arm-chair and stretched his 
legs towards the logs. He always made himself at 
home. What he called making himself at home was 
to ignore more or less those rules of social behavior 
which a social order imposes for the sake of mak- 
ing any social order possible. Lucilla, looking at 
Stephen as he sprawled in the arm-chair, contrasted 
•him with its previous occupant, and smiled men- 
tally at the contrast. The soldier, well set up, com- 
pact of strength and firmness, clean, trim, healthy, 
with his clear skin and clear eyes, seemed to belong ^ 
to another department of the animal kingdom from 
Budget, in his baggy clothes, with his dusky face, 
his yellowed eyes, his flame of dishevelled hair, his 
uncomeliness. 

Now, as he wallowed in the arm-chair, with his 
waistcoat wrinkled up so as to display a space of 
dubious linen between it and the waistband of his 
trousers ; and as those trousers, wrinkled up in their 


8o 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


turn where his feet crossed, displayed dubious 
stockings falling in folds about his ankles, he was 
a curious specimen of the careless in mankind. 
He thrust his hands, not into his pockets, but into 
the waistband of his trousers, thus further accentu- 
ating the gap between it and the waistcoat, and 
turned his large round face, a face like a dingy 
moon, alternately upon his hostess and his host. 
He had no idea that his demeanor was in any way 
unadmirable ; if he had thought about it at all, it 
would have been to reflect upon the pleasantness 
of knowing people like the Windovers, with whom 
one did n’t have to stand on ceremony. For to be- 
have like a civilized creature was, with Stephen 
Budget, to stand upon ceremony. 

Stephen Budget, in spite of fliis indolent nature, 
or perhaps because of his indolent nature, was a 
shrewd enough observer of life and of men and 
women. As he lolled there in that chair, he no- 
ticed quickly enough, from the faces of the woman 
and the man, that something had occurred to agi- 
tate them, though whether pleasantly or unpleas- 
antly he could not determine. 

“ You look as if something has happened,” he 
said, still looking from one to the other. Has 
anything happened, Lucilla ? ” 

Well,” said Lucilla slowly, “ something may be 
said to have happened.” 


A CABINET COUNCIL. 


8l 


^^Yes,” said Anthony; “and something rather 
curious, too, for that matter.” 

The moon-face of Budget travelled slowly on its 
path from the woman to the man. 

“ Explain the mystery,” he suggested. 

“We have just had a visitor,” said Windover. 

“Yes,” said Lucilla, an amplifying echo of her 
husband’s words — “ a very curious visitor.” 

“ Explain his mystery”’ Budget suggested again. 

Windover answered him with a question. 

“ Did you ever hear of a Colonel Rockielaw ? ” 
he asked, with a gallant effort to make his voice 
sound quite indifferent as he spoke the name. 

“ Rockielaw ? ” said Budget. “ Let me see. Did 
something in Afghanistan, or the Soudan, or some- 
thing, didn’t he ? ” 

“ Even so,” answered Windover ; and then he 
told Budget, who listened attentively, the whole 
story of Colonel Rockielaw’s visit, of the conversa- 
sation they had had, and of the proposal which 
Colonel Rockielaw had made. 

“ Well,” he said as he ended, “ what do you think 
of that?” 

“ What do I think of it ? ” Budget replied. “ What 
do you think of it ? That is more important. 
What does Lucilla think of it ? That is the most 
important of all.” 

“ Lucilla has n’t made up her mind,” answered 
6 


82 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Windover ; “ naturally, neither have I. It is rather 
a serious proposition.” 

“ It is a very serious proposition,” said Budget 
gravely. His mind was busy with possibilities for 
his own advantage out of all this, and he spoke 
slowly, measuring his words. 

“ Of course it is a serious proposition,” said 
Lucilla. 

“Well,” Budget said, “what do you think of 
this serious proposition, Lucilla ? Do you think 
Windover would make a good Prime Minister?” 

“ Of course he would,” Lucilla said stoutly. 

Windover laughed, and observed that they had n’t 
quite come to that yet. 

“ No,” said Budget, with the air of one who 
mused aloud. “ But every member of Parliament 
is like the traditional French soldier : he carries 
the marshal’s baton in his knapsack. Now tell me, 
Windover, would you really like to be Prime Min- 
ister ? ” 

“ It is not a question of his being Prime Minister 
just at present,” said Lucilla a little sharply. “ The 
immediate question is. Should he entertain this 
offer ? ” 

“ Quite so,” said the unabashable Budget — 
“ quite so ; I was coming to that. Now, do you 
really think that you would like the kind of life 
that Parliament compels a man to live ? ” 


A CABINET COUNCIL. 83 

Windover was about to reply, but Lucilla again 
cut in. 

“ How can he tell till he tries it ? ” she asked. 

She had not at first been very pleased at the pro- 
posal but Budget’s manner irritated her. She could 
see that for some reason he was trying to dissuade 
Windover from accepting the proposal, and that 
made her angry,and inclined to urge its acceptance. 

‘‘Well,” said Budget, “we all know what the 
Parliamentary life is like : how completely it ab- 
sorbs a man’s time ; how it interferes with other 
and perhaps higher work ; how it destroys the 
happy home life.” 

Budget was looking at Windover while he spoke, 
but he could see from the corner of his eye that 
Lucilla gave a little shiver at these last words. 

“ A man who enters Parliament — a conscientious 
man, of course I mean — must be prepared to sacri- 
fice for it his leisure, his occupations, his friends, 
his family — everything. Now, do you really feel, 
my dear Windover, that you can do more good to 
the cause you have at heart by making that sacri- 
fice than you are already doing in your own excel- 
lent sphere of work ? ” 

“ That is, of course, the question which I have 
asked myself,” answered Windover. 

“ And how have you answered it ? ” Budget 
asked. 


84 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

“ I have not answered it yet,” said Windover. 
I am uncertain if I should serve the interests I 
have at heart better by entering public life.” 

“ If I were in your place, I don’t think that I 
should accept,” said Budget slowly. “ I don’t 
think you would like the life. I don’t think that 
you would do so much good to your party there as 
here. And how would Lucilla like seeing so little 
of you ? ” 

“There is a Ladies’ Gallery, I believe,” said 
Lucilla. 

“Yes,” said Budget; “there is a Ladies’ Gal- 
lery, and a dismal place it is. But you could n’t 
pass your life in the Ladies’ Gallery, Lucilla ; and 
Windover would have to pass the greater part of 
his life at Westminster. I think a married man — 
I mean, of course, a man who is happily married — 
is to be pitied who enters Parliament. Of course, 
if he is not unwilling to escape from his hearth and 
home, that is a different matter entirely.” 

Lucilla gave another little shiver, which Budget 
noted. He could see that the argument was not 
without its effect upon Windover as well. 

“ It ’s a very different thing for an unmarried 
man — for a man like myself, for instance,” he went 
on. He paused for a moment, and then, as if a 
sudden and quite unexpected thought had struck 
him, he said, “ I tell you what, Windover, if you 
do make up your mind not to accept, you might 


A CABINET COUNCIL. 85 

put in a good word for me. I should like it well 
enough.” 

Windover stared at him in complete surprise. 
Lucilla stared, too, but she was not so surprised. 

“ You, my dear fellow ? ” said Windover. “ You ? 
But I don’t think you quite understand. The pro- 
posal comes from my camp. You are a Radical, 
a Republican, a Red — the Boanerges of Radical 
debating-rooms. What have you to do in a galley 
that is steered by the Sylphs ? ” 

There was a shade of embarrassment in Budget’s 
voice when he answered. 

“ Oh, come ; I ’m not so extreme as all that, and, 
besides, I believe that in the end we advanced peo- 
ple will get what we want more from your folk than 
the others. A plague on both your houses. There 
is not a whit to choose between your Tory and your 
Whig, and I would as soon fight for my own hand 
under the shadow of one flag as the other. Call 
me opportunist if you like.” 

“ I don’t know about its being opportunism,” 
said Lucilla ; but is it honest ? ” 

“ Honest ! ” Budget said, “ honest ! My dear 
Lucilla, honesty in politics consists in winning your 
own battle — the battle of your cause, of course. 
My cause is the cause of the people, and to aid that 
I would as soon serve the Sylphs as the Liberals.” 

“ I am afraid you might find it rather hard to 
impress upon the Sylphs the advantage of your al- 


86 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


liance,” said Windover dryly. “ They mightn’t 
see the relationship between your views and their 
views, between your aims and their airfis.” 

“ Perhaps not,” said Budget. “ In any case, it 
was only a suggestion of mine, in case you should 
not care about it yourself. But I hope you will 
take it if you think you will like it in the long 
run.” 

It had grown quite dark. Lucilla had risen, and 
was lighting one of the large lamps that stood in 
the corners of the studio. Budget shifted his large 
legs, and made a move as if to go. Windover, of 
course, did what Budget expected that he would 
do, asked him to stay to dinner. Budget settled 
down again into the roomy chair, and quietly 
turned the talk away from politics to literature. 
He and Windover were deep in the discussion of 
a new French novel, when the door opened and 
Brander Swift came in. 

Lucilla advanced to meet him with an exclama- 
tion of welcome. Windover jumped up from his 
chair. Budget lounged round, and grinned a salu- 
tation. Lucilla noticed that Swift looked pale, and 
asked him if he were unwell, and Swift answered 
that he was merely a trifle tired from overworking 
a little. Budget said that overwork was a bad 
thing, at which they all laughed, and soon after 
they all went in to dinner. 


CHAPTER VII. 


A CONVERSATION. 

I tell you she ’s a marvel : never yet 
Since Lilith snared old grandsire Adam’s wits 
Has such a woman walked our common earth 
And made it precious, such a woman talked 
And made poor words seem jewels. 

The Minions of the Moon. 

N aturally enough the first thing that 
Lucilla told Swift, as soon as they were 
all seated, was the news of the proposal to 
Anthony. And, naturally enough, the first thing 
that Swift did was to offer his heartiest congratula- 
tions. 

“ Of course I think your doctrines and your dog- 
mas are detestable,” he said ; “ but so long as we 
allow them to be expressed at Westminster, they 
could not be better expressed than by you.” 

“ Listen to the Terrorist,” Anthony entreated. 
“ Here we have the crier of the Cry for Liberty 
proposing to suppress the opinions of his adversa- 
ries. Va^ Septembriseur^ va !” 

“ My dear boy,” Budget interpolated, “ the Cry 
87 


88 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


for Liberty resembles other inspired Scriptures at 
least in this, that you can draw arguments from it 
in defence of any doctrine, however devilish.” 

Budget still affected extreme scepticism in the 
company of his intimate friends, although his pub- 
lic views had become less pronounced since the 
advanced Welsh party in Parliament had estab- 
lished a newspaper of their own, and had accepted 
Stephen’s services as London correspondent. It 
entertained him to associate Swift’s book disdain- 
fully with the world’s oracles, and he hoped that 
the association might annoy Swift. For in his 
heart Budget disliked the Cry for Liberty ; in the 
first place because he thought it ridiculous, and in 
the second place because it had made a kind of 
success. Budget had a keen appreciation of the 
ridiculous in others, a keen envy of the success of 
others. 

But, somewhat to his disappointment. Swift 
took the sneer with indifference. Swift had the 
exaltation of the zealot, and he had heard so many 
raptures about his book among the politicians of 
St. Ethelfreda’s Without that there were moments 
when he was well-nigh ready to accept Budget’s 
jest as earnest. 

“ Mephistopheles can quote Scripture for his 
own purposes,” he said. “ And I dare say that 
when Windover is leading the last rally of the old 


A CONVERSATION. 


89 


order in the House of Commons he will often im- 
potently assail the Mountain with passages from 
my masterpiece. But the Mountain will not 
mind.” 

It was one of Swift’s political affectations, as it 
was the affectation of the members of the Corde- 
liers’ Club in St. Ethelfreda’s Without, to assume 
that the principles and the phrases of the French 
Revolution applied with absolute accuracy to the 
conditions of public life in England. 

‘‘ If the Mountain will not come to Windover, 
Windover must come to the Mountain,” Budget 
said, and laughed boisterously at his own witticism. 

“ Don’t let ’s talk any more politics,” Lucilla 
pleaded. “ Anthony is not Prime Minister yet, 
however much he deserves to be ; and Brander is 
not yet the President of a Committee of Public 
Safety. But I am a woman, and I want to hear 
all about this wonderful woman.” 

“ What woman ? ” Budget asked quickly. 

“ Why, who but Dorothy Carteret — who but 
she ? ” Windover suggested gaily. “ The fair, the 
debonair, the discerning. Do you know anything 
about her, Budget ? ” 

“ Do I know anything about her — do I know 
anything about her ? ” Budget repeated plaintively, 
all the London correspondent flooding his eyes 
with light. “ Anything ? Say everything ! ” 


90 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Come, that ’s comprehensive,” said Windover. 
“ Then tell us everything, if everything is tellable.” 

“ Oh, I don’t know. I suppose so,” Budget an- 
swered. His lips moved with a large enjoyment in 
possibilities of innuendo. “ Where shall I begin ?” 

“ Begin at the beginning,” Lucilla suggested, 
“ and go on to the end, and then stop. It is the 
counsel of the King of Hearts.” 

“ I beg your pardon,” Budget said dubiously. 

“ Oh, it ’s from Alice in Wonderland^' Lucilla 
answered. “ Never mind me ; go on.” 

“ Well,” said Budget slowly, as one who deliv- 
ered words of weight, “ in the first place. Miss Car- 
teret is the only daughter, and for that matter the 
only child, of Lord Godolphin.” 

“ And who is Lord Godolphin ? ” Lucilla asked. 

“ Lord Godolphin, ” Budget answered, “ is, as 
it were, a man born out of due season. He might 
have been appropriate at certain moments of the 
history of the eighteenth century ; in our day he is 
an anachronism, and not an agreeable anachro- 
nism. 1 don’t think that the pleasure he derives 
from shocking people by the contrast between him- 
self and his age quite consoles him for the inappro- 
priateness of his environment.” 

“ He must be an agreeable man,” said Lucilla. 

Anthony endorsed the criticism. 

Swift said nothing. The turn that the conversa- 
tion had taken did not greatly interest him. The 


A CONVERSATION. 


91 


infamy of aristocrats was, if not a proclaimed 
canon of his creed, at least portion and parcel of 
the glorious Jacobin tradition. And besides, his 
mind was busy with other thoughts, with a divine 
face crowned with dark hair and glorious with 
blue eyes. Budget went on solemnly with his 
narrative. 

“ Yes,” he said, “ Godolphin is a weird creature. 
He would have made a good companion for ‘‘ Old 
Q,” but he is somewhat companionless in the days 
that pass when even the effete nobility you cham- 
pion, occasionally turn their hands to some honest 
or some honorable occupation. It is said of him 
that he boasts that there is n’t a sin he has n’t 
sinned, but I doubt that.” 

“ Doubt that he makes such a boast ? ” asked 
Windover, as Budget paused for a moment. 

“ Oh dear no ! only doubt the truth of the 
boast,” Budget answered cheerily. “ He ’s an awful 
liar, as well as everything else. But I make no 
doubt that he has done his best.” 

“ And do people like this — person ? ” Lucilla 
asked, with a glow on her cheeks. 

“ No, I don’t think people do,” Budget answered. 
“ I should n’t think that he was generally beloved. 
But indeed he makes no bid for general affection.” 

“ How,” Anthony asked, “ does this old rogue 
come to have for a daughter this nonpareil of 
women ? ” 


92 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ In the first place, Godolphin, being a bad man, 
married a good woman. That often happens. It 
was n’t the girl’s innocence that tempted him ; he 
was tired of innocence as he was tired of every- 
thing else ” 

“ How on earth do you come to know all this ? ” 
Windover asked with a slight smile. ‘‘Were you 
ever a pal of Lord Godolphin’ s ? ” 

Budget parried Anthony’s stroke with affability. 

“ Look here ! ” he said, “ am I bossing this story 
or are you ? Where did I get my information ? 
Where does the London correspondent usually get 
his information ? Report, rumor, the society jour- 
nals, what you please. Imagine yourself one of my 
readers and be thankful, or else tell thou the tale.” 

“ Oh, please go on,” said Lucilla in reply to Bud- 
get’s appeal. “We all want to hear about it — don’t 
we, Brander ? ” 

Swift roused himself from his reverie to assure 
Lucilla that he wanted very much to hear all about 
it. He had not been paying any attention to Bud- 
get’s remarks, and was really engrossed by the 
problem how he should manage to make a week 
pass as quickly as possible, the week that lay be- 
tween him and her. 

“ Well,” Budget went on, “ Godolphin married 
this woman because she was very rich. She was 
Australian or American, or something of that sort, 


A CONVERSATION. 


93 


an exotic, a colonial bird with golden feathers. She 
was enormously rich, and Godolphin promised him- 
self the pleasure of spending all the money. He 
was disappointed. She was a good woman, but she 
was not a fool ; she came of shrewd folk with whom 
foolishness was at a discount. Godolphin found 
himself married to a woman who had managed to 
retain control of her own property. This mattered 
little so long as she was fond of Godolphin, but 
the devil of it was — I beg your pardon, Lucilla, I 
mean the worst of it was, that she soon found him 
out. I believe that even he was surprised at the 
seriousness with which she took the discovery of 
his character and his record. She did not divorce 
him, although she could have easily, never mind 
why. But she insisted that she would have nothing 
more to do with him ; she insisted that she should 
have the sole control of her child, and as she had 
the money and Godolphin had n’t, he was obliged 
to come to terms. They were not bad terms for 
him. She made him a rich man so long as he left 
her and her daughter in peace. If he failed to do 
this he became a beggar. Godolphin had no desire 
to be a beggar ; he did not care for wives — at least, 
for his own wife — and he disliked children. So he 
made the bargain and enjoyed himself after his own 
unpleasant habit in Europe and elsewhere, and 
Lady Godolphin brought up little Dorothy in her 


94 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


own way, and a very odd way it was. She taught 
her all sorts of things that girls are not usually 
taught. She did everything to give her health and 
strength, and she succeeded. She died just after 
Dorothy was twenty-one, leaving the girl her bless- 
ing, an enormous fortune, and absolute freedom. 
Lord Godolphin did not attend the funeral.” 

“ What a curious education ! ” said Lucilla. 
“ Lady Godolphin must have been a woman of con- 
siderable strength of character.” 

“ It is from her that the nonpareil derives,” com- 
mented Windover. 

“ Well, I was coming to that,” Budget said. “Yes 
and no. I am not at all sure that the young lady 
is by any means such a nonpareil. There is some 
strain of the paternal blood in her, I should say.” 

“ How does that come out ? ” Lucilla asked, and 
there was quite an anxious note in her voice, for 
she found herself getting deeply interested in 
Dorothy Carteret. 

“ Oh, she ’s a wild mad thing,” Budget answered ; 
“ she acts just as if she were a man, and does ex- 
actly what she pleases, and she is famous for her 
eccentricities. Why, it is said of her that one even- 
ing, for a wager, she ran all round Berkeley Square 
with nothing on but her chemise.” 

“ What a disagreeable young woman ! ” said 
Swift. 


A CONVERSATION. 


95 


“ The story may not be true,” Windover sug- 
gested quietly. 

“ Do you deny the chemise, or the whole story ? ” 
Budget asked. “ Of course it may not be true, but 
it serves to show the kind of stories that are told 
about her. There are a lot more — heaps of them. 
I could pay them out all the night.” 

“ If they are all of the kind you suggested just 
now,” Swift said dryly, “ perhaps it would be as 
well to spare us.” 

Budget snorted contempt, but Lucilla gave Swift 
a little flash of gratitude. She liked Swift’s fastidi- 
ous chivalry as much as she disliked Budget’s leer- 
ing cynicism. 

“ All right,” said Budget, “ we will confine our- 
selves to those anecdotes of Miss Carteret’s career 
whicii are suited virginibus puerisque. Of course 
the most famous thing about her is her association 
with the Sylphs.” 

“ Colonel Rockielaw said a good deal about the 
Sylphs,” Lucilla observed ; but I do not think I 
understood very clearly what or why they were.” 

“ I am not sure that anybody does,” Budget an- 
swered — “ not even Miss Carteret herself, perhaps. 
I wrote a long account of them the other day.” 

“ Are you a Sylph by strange chance ? ” Win- 
dover asked. 

“ Oh no ! ” Budget said, and the tone of his voice 


96 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


seemed to suggest that the utmost pressure had 
been brought to bear upon him to induce him to 
join the mystic brotherhood, and that he, stanch to 
the tenets of the Cordeliers’ Club, had sternly re- 
fused. “ Oh no ! It would be impossible for me 
to be a Sylph, but, of course, I have heard a great 
deal about them, and it ’s my own impression that 
Miss Carteret got up the whole thing in the begin- 
ning as a kind of joke, and that, finding the game 
caught on, she went on playing at it.” 

“ But what is the game anyhow, and what are the 
rules of the game ? ” Lucilla asked. “ That is 
what I want to get at.” 

“I am afraid you want to know too much,” 
Budget answered — “ at least, for me to tell you. 
They pretend to influence thought, and society, 
and politics, and, generally speaking, to regenerate 
everything and everybody. They want to revolu- 
tionize, as the Laputans built their houses, from 
the top downwards.” 

“ But how does society accept this wild young 
woman ? ” Windover asked. “ Does she live by 
herself ? ” 

“Not absolutely,” Budget answered. “There 
is a dragon, old Lady Lissingham, who was a Car- 
teret, and who dates from the year one. The girl 
lives with her, or, rather, she lives with the girl, for 
she shares the Carteret poverty. But she is a very 


A CONVERSATION. 


97 


tame and toothless dragon, and the girl goes her 
own wild way and imposes herself upon an amazed 
and amused society. Besides, the Ambers are de- 
voted to her, and the Ambers are respectability 
itself. Lady Amber presented her, and adores her.” 

“ The Ambers,” said Windover. “ Anything to 
Amber Pasha ? ” 

“ Sir Charles Amber is Amber Pasha’s eldest 
brother,” Budget answered. 

“ I have met Amber Pasha,” Windover said. “ I 
thought him one of the most interesting men I ever 
saw. I often hear about him. A young fellow I 
used to know, a man named Oldacre — Gabriel 
Oldacre — is with him in Constantinople as his sec- 
retary. He used to write for the Arbiter. We 
often correspond.” 

“ Sir Charles is n’t a bit like his brother,” Budget 
said. “ He is a solemn, stately, old true-blue Tory. 
If you do stand for the Pine Hill Division you will 
probably see a good deal of him, for the Towers is 
the great house of the place.” 

“ If I stand ? ” Windover said meditatively, more 
to himself than to any-one else. 

Budget shot a sharp glance at him, and changed 
the subject. 

No more politics was talked, and nothing more 
was said about the Sylphs. After dinner Lucilla 
gave them a little music, and Swift listened and 

7 


98 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


dreamed, and was so quiet that they laughed at his 
silence ; and he apologized by explaining that he 
was somewhat fatigued by an overdose of German 
scholarship. He said nothing to his friends about 
his day’s adventures, but he thought about them a 
good deal through all the talk and the laughter ; 
and he wondered what Lucilla would think of his 
love affair, and what Windover would think of the 
snake-charmer. He felt sure that they would agree 
with him that his antagonist of Primrose Hill must 
be a madman. 

When the little gathering broke up. Swift walked 
home with Budget, and Budget was cynical and 
salacious, after his fashion, untouched by the soft 
night air and the soft stars. Swift paid little heed, 
and was hardly annoyed. The divine influences 
of night, the spell of the stars, were strong upon 
him, and he thought the world enchanted. 

When he got home at last, he said to himself, as 
he turned into bed : “ Well, I have had enough 

adventures for one day, anyhow.” He was very 
tired, and he slept a dreamless sleep. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

THE heart’s desire. 

How often, best beloved, have my feet 
Led me, the stricken lover, to thy street ; 

How often in the teeth of hope have I 
Whispered, It may be that to-day we meet ! 

The Rubaiyat of Abdallah of Bagdad. 

T hough a week may seem as long to a lover 
as the sleep of Kaiser Redbeard, yet it 
comes to its end at last. But at first it 
seemed to Swift as if the tread of Time had halted ; 
as if the laws of the universe were unhinged ; as if 
hours were juggled into years, and days into cen- 
turies. The eccentricity, the adventurousness, of 
the first day of probation, had made it pass like a 
dream ; but eccentricity is not to be expected or 
even desired every day, and the days that followed 
crawled along the pathway of the commonplace. 
Swift swore oaths, after the manner of Hannibal, 
that he would do mountains of work ; but work is 
no mausoleum for the frenzy of love, and the moun- 
tain of the morning dream ended in the mole-hill 
of the evening’s accomplishment. Swift was lapped 
99 


lOO 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


in idleness, but it was an idleness that fretted, not 
an idleness that soothed. 

He did not go near the British Museum ; that, 
he felt, would be an infringement of the treaty. 
So he strove to stay at home and toil ; but he 
chafed at his toil. Even a fire-new theory on the 
sub-divisions of the Homeric epics, hot from the 
Leipzig presses, failed to stir his pulses. What to 
him was this quintessence of dust, while there was 
somewhere or other in the world a beautiful woman 
whom it was his heart’s desire to see again ? So it 
usually came to pass that, after dawdling through 
the young hours of the day at his work-table, he 
would push his books away from him in a rage, 
fling on his hat, and go for a walk and sigh for a 
nameless angel. 

He was pained to find that even politics could 
not absorb his mind as they once did. He walked 
over on a couple of evenings to St. Ethelfreda’s 
Without, to that curious quarter of London which 
had been reduced to ruin by a crime, only to be 
exalted to splendor by a criminal. At most times 
the welfare of St. Ethelfreda’s interested him im- 
mensely ; he was on very good terms with the 
Vicar, the Rev. Erastus Albany ; he liked to see 
the place growing in beauty ; he was attracted by 
the experiment which had converted the sordidest, 
wretchedest cantle of London into a kind of earthly 


THE heart’s desire. 


lOI 


paradise ; he rejoiced in its great people’s palace, 
and he admired the conduct of the man whose sin 
had blighted the place and whose repentance had 
redeemed it. Moreover, it was in the parish of St. 
Ethelfreda’s Without that the Cordeliers’ Club held 
their meeting and thundered to the four winds 
against all forms of tyranny. He attended two 
vehement meetings of the club and took his part 
in the inevitable stormy discussion and was much 
applauded, for the author of the Cry for Liberty 
was highly esteemed by the Cordeliers, and he 
listened to Budget, who was the president for the 
year, while he poured the fiery incoherence of his 
eloquence over an enraptured assembly. But all 
these things did not delight or animate or entertain 
him as of old they had delighted, animated, and 
entertained. He was furious with himself for his 
folly, and yet he was pleased with himself, too, in 
a way, for he and the world seemed to have grown 
younger together ever since his heart began to ache. 
But he hardly dared to imagine what the Cordeliers 
would have thought if they had known that the 
author of the Cry for Liberty was allowing his 
heart to ache for a woman of whose opinions on 
all the great social questions he was wholly igno- 
rant. 

At last, however, at long last, the week came to 
an end. Though it had seemed otherwise to Swift, 


102 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


the seconds, the minutes, and the hours had per- 
formed their allotted task at their appointed speed. 
The days went by exactly as they had been doing 
since the dawn of Time, and filled methodically 
the measure of the week. While the measure of 
the week was filling, one month had died and a new 
one was some three days old. The same false air 
of spring persevered, and on the morning of the 
long-desired day when Swift awoke from the in- 
variable dream about the ideal, and realized that 
the eventful epoch had dawned, the sky still seemed 
to wear the favor of May. 

The hand on the dial which Swift’s gaze so often 
consulted did at last point to half-past eleven. 
Then with a sigh Swift pulled himself together 
and got ready to go forth and learn his fate. 


CHAPTER IX. 


THE HOUSE OF ART. 

Heart, oh, my heart, shall I see her to-day? 

How will she look on me, what shall I say ? 

Shall I have courage to say I adore her ? 

Or talk aesthetics, and possibly bore her ? 

Shall I whisper of love, or pronounce upon art ? 

Shall I read in her eyes that she reads in my heart ? 

Will she give me a cue for the part I ’m to play ? 

Heart, oh, my heart, shall I see her to-day ? 

Love at College, 

S WIFT walked through the bright streets with 
a beating heart, and breathed the warm air 
with trepidation. Now that the dreamed- 
of, sighed-for hour had arrived he experienced a 
kind of passion of nervousness which was well- 
nigh unbearable. He almost wished that it were 
not the day, not the hour ; and when he turned 
into Museum Street and paused before the lion- 
guarded railings, he experienced a kind of tugging 
at his heart which urged him to take to his heels 
and run away. It really seemed to him that he 
had to make a kind of effort to persevere in his 
adventure. 

103 


104 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


He got to the Museum much too soon. That 
was, of course, inevitable. A clock chimed out 
three strokes as he passed through the gates, and 
told him that it still wanted a quarter to twelve. 
He shivered nervously as he crossed the open 
space. It was a fine day, as that day week had 
been. There was the same clear, pale sunlight, 
the same defined shadows, the same bright sky. 
As before, the pigeons were fluttering about and 
enjoying themselves. Swift’s ready imagination 
converted them into doves for the occasion, and 
changed the Museum into some temple to Venus 
upon a breezy headland. Should he find within 
that temple “ a priestess as lovely as a vision ” ? 
He felt inclined to frame foolish pagan prayers ; 
the line about “the simplicity of Venus’ doves ” 
hummed in his head. As he climbed the steps he 
found that his fingers were quivering with excite- 
ment, and he entered the dark hall with a sigh. 

For ten minutes he wandered about in every part 
of the Museum except the one part to which he 
wanted to go. Then he made his way as quickly 
as possible to the Elgin Room. 

He did not dare to expect to find her there, but 
he was conscious of a great ache at his heart when 
he passed into the presence of the antique gods, 
and found that they lacked one very modern di- 
vinity. The maimed marbles seemed to him to 


THE HOUSE OF ART. 


105 


cry aloud, as his own hot heart cried aloud, for the 
living beauty, for the flesh and blood, for the youth 
of one English girl, whose very name he could not 
confide to those ruins of Greece. There were only 
a few people in the gallery. They moved with a 
certain indifference among the ancient things. 
Swift felt a sudden contempt for people of their 
kind, people who could dawdle in the presence of 
such a heritage. But even as he sneered he had 
• the decency to be ashamed of his sneering, and to 
flush guiltily as he remembered that he himself was 
there not out of homage to the gods forgotten in 
Greece, and that he, the scholar, the preacher of 
aesthetics, was just as human, just as indifferent to 
the past, just as absorbed in the present, as any 
idler of them all. 

He took out his watch and looked at it. It was 
only just noon ; the large hand had not travelled 
a minute’s space away from the hour. He put it 
back again with a sigh. 

“ How long shall I wait ? ” he asked himself. 
“ How long shall I linger here in expectation ? She 
may come late. I must wait till half past, at all 
events. She may come very late. I must wait till 
one o’clock. She may not come at all. I cannot 
wait here forever ; but I will wait till one o’clock.” 

In that very instant he saw her, in the distance, 
coming leisurely along the gallery. 


io6 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


He knew that his face must be absurdly red to 
look at, for it felt painfully hot. The realization 
of his week’s hope, the reward of his week’s vigil, 
seemed, as great rewards often seem, a joy too great 
h;o accept, too great for belief. But it was believa- 
ble — it was true. He was standing in the Elgin 
Room, and the woman of his dreams and days was 
walking towards him. 

He raised his hat and murmured “ Good morn- 
ing.” He was very happy, but happiness made* 
him embarrassed. The girl was not in the least 
embarrassed. She held out her hand as compos- 
edly as if Swift had been her oldest friend. Swift 
took it as reverently as if it had been the hand of 
an angel. 

Good morning,” said the girl. So you have 
come — so you really did remember. I was won- . 
dering if you would.” 

“Was it likely that I should forget ?” Swift an- 
swered very earnestly. “ Was it likely that I should 
fail to come ? ” 

The girl looked steadily into his flushed, eager 
face, his eager eyes. 

“ Perhaps it was not very likely,” she said quietly. 
“ In any case, you have not forgotten, and you are 
here, and I am very glad to see you. What are 
you going to show me to-day ? what are you going 
to teach me ? ” 


THE HOUSE OF ART. 


107 


Just as there was no vanity in her assumption 
that Swift was not likely to forget, so there was no 
show of audacity in her welcome, in her readiness 
to accept his companionship. To her there seemed 
to be nothing strange in the situation. 

“ Ah,” said Swift, with something that was very 
like a sigh, “ I begin to think that it is I who am 
the learner here, and learning for the first time.” 

Although he was terribly embarrassed by her 
beauty and his own passion, he was not afraid to 
speak his mind. It was part of his theory of life 
— it was consistent with the Cry for Liberty — that 
a man should say his say on occasion, and now the 
strangeness of the situation, the unexpected joy, 
gave him courage. 

The girl looked at him quite gravely, as if there 
was nothing at all surprising in his words. 

“ Perhaps you are right,” she said. “ But that 
also is in the hands of the gods. You see that I can 
talk in harmony with my surroundings.” And she 
saluted the Olympians with a wave of her hand, 
and smiled at Swift in a way that made his heart 
drum again. 

He was bewildered by her — by her manner, which 
was at once so frank, so companionable, and so al- 
luring. He looked back at her, wondering, in a 
vague kind of way, what were the odds against 
him at Fortune’s gaming-table that this woman 
could ever love him, could ever let him kiss her. 


Io8 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

They were walking now very slowly along the 
room, and were near to the Ephesian pillar, which 
had been their tryst. 

“ Well,” she said, “ what are you going to teach 
me ? I want to know all about the Greeks, and I 
want to know it quickly. I always want every- 
thing quickly ; I hate to wait and wait.” 

She was smiling at her own vehemence, and he 
smiled with her. What he wanted to say was, 
“ You are very beautiful. I love you. Do not let 
us waste our time with the Greeks, or with any- 
body or anything except you and me, your beauty, 
and my love.” 

But did he not say anything of the kind. He 
spoke with an affectation of her own jesting mood. 

“ Before I begin to attempt the impossible, let 
me prove myself worthy of the esteem of one very 
famous Greek,” he said. “ Diogenes took his lan- 
tern to look for an honest man. Let me show that 
if he were in London here and now he would find 
one honest man.” 

“Are you so exceptionally honest?” said the 
girl. 

“Yes,” he said; “I think I am exceptionally 
honest.” He slipped his hand into his breast- 
pocket and took out the little golden brooch. He 
held it out to her in the hollow of his hand. 

“You let this fall last week,” he said. “I only 


THE HOUSE OF ART. 


109 


found it after you had gone. You would never 
have known that I had found it, and I might have 
kept it — for luck.” 

“ Thank you,” she said, “ I had missed it, and I 
was sorry, for it has associations.” 

“ I hope,” he said, “ that you will not mind if I 
keep the violets.” 

“ Have you kept them ? ” 

He took the book out of his pocket and showed 
her the faded flowers pressed between the leaves. 
He did it so simply, as if it were the most natural 
action in the world, that its sentimentality did not 
jar, and she smiled. 

Yes, you may keep them, if you please. They 
sleep in a fair sepulchre. Let them sleep in peace.” 

He put the book back into his pocket. He did 
not quite know what to say or do next ; his hesi- 
tancy seemed to return. But the girl was not in 
the least perturbed by the passage of sentimen- 
talism. She seemed to take Swift’s admiration for 
granted, without affectation and without vanity. 
Swift was asking himself if he should say anything 
about the adventure on Primrose Hill. He decided 
not to speak. If the episode had any possible refer- 
ence to her it might annoy her. But his reflections 
made a pause which she broke. 

“ Come,” she said, “ let me begin my lesson. 
Teach me the secret of Greek art.” 


no A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

“ The secret of Greek art is beauty,” Swift said. 
“ It is the secret of life, I think.” 

He was conscious that his words were not very 
relevant, and he colored slightly and tried to as- 
sume the professorial manner. 

“ Let us begin at the beginning,” he said, and he 
led the way to the room where the archaic art was 
represented in the figures from ^gina. 


CHAPTER X. 


NOX MIHI CANDIDA. 


Exquisite madness, 

That lays the world and all its emperies, 

Its seas and all their opulent argosies, 

Its mines, with all their sooty bosoms hold 
Of gold and ruby, diamond, chrysophras, 

Within the hollow of a maiden’s hand : 

Exquisite madness ! 

The Devil's Comedy. 

S WIFT had occasion afterwards to note that 
the events which are of the most conse- 
quence to ourselves are not always those 
which burn themselves in the most minute detail 
upon the tablet of the mind. Thus, though the 
day when he re-met his unknown idol seemed to 
Swift to be the blessedest day in all the calendar, 
he was never able in later days to trace out with 
perfect distinctness all the exact procession of the 
events that made it blessed. He could not pre- 
cisely recall the course of the conversation, what 
he exactly said to her, and what she exactly said 
to him which made them seem ere they parted 


1 12 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

already a little more than friends, if so much less 
than lovers. In the fine exhilaration of the spirit 
which love kindles in a romantic mind events 
sweep by, and leave behind the most exquisite 
consciousness of having lived well, but no distinct 
consciousness of all that went to make up the de- 
light and the life. 

He could remember that they sat in the little 
room that is devoted to the archaic phase of Greek 
sculpture, and that they looked at the reproductions 
of the queer Homeric figures who battle in an an- 
gular immortality upon the reproduction of the 
^gina temple. The smile of Achilles, the weird 
child-like smile with which the old craftsman en- 
dowed his hero, seemed as if it were stirred in some 
way by them, as if the beautiful shadow of Thetis’s 
boy, here by no means beautiful, by no means a 
shadow, were watching them with a leer of half- 
disdainful sympathy from his odd fish-shaped eyes. 
Swift pointed out the different figures to the girl, 
and had talked learnedly of dates and theories, and 
had expressed some doubts as to the accuracy of 
certain names attributed to the images. That sud- 
denly reminded him of a curious fact. 

“ Here am I,” he said, “ talking never so wisely 
about the names of these forgotten Greeks, which 
do not matter at all, and all the while I do not know 
your name, which matters a great deal,’* 


NOX MIHI CANDIDA. 


II3 

The girl laughed. 

“ Yet we seem to be pretty good friends already. 
Friendship does not depend upon names. It is how 
we think of each other, not how we call each other, 
that is really important.” 

She paused and looked steadily into his puzzled 
face with a dainty air of mischief. Swift was a 
little puzzled, for her frankness was so gracious 
that he was surprised to find it seem so natural. 

“ If I were to think of you,” he said slowly, “ I 
should have to think of all the most beautiful 
names that the Greeks ever gave to their most 
beautiful women, and then I should choose the 
fairest, and find it unworthy of the most fair.” 

“ That is very pretty,” said the girl, “ and all the 
prettier because, in spite of its exaggeration, you 
said it so sincerely that it does not sound exagger- 
ated.” 

“ Sincerely,” cried Swift, “ sincerely ! Why, you 
know, you must know ” 

What he was going to say he hardly knew him- 
self ; he felt like a man in a dream, free to forget 
the world, free to say what he pleased. But the 
girl stopped him. 

“ Stop,” she said ; “ I will tell you my name be- 
fore you think of one too pretty and become dis- 
appointed with the reality. My name is Candida 

Knox.” 

8 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


1 14 

“ Candida Knox ! ” said Swift. “ What a curi- 
ous name ! " 

“ It is certainly a curious name,” Miss Knox said 
quietly. 

“ It reminds me of something,” said Swift. “ Ah, 
yes, of course ; it reminds me of a line in an old 
Latin poet, Propertius, in which he speaks of a 
‘ Nox mihi Candida,’ which means ” 

“ O night so white to me or so fair to me,” in- 
terrupted Miss Knox. “ I know a little Latin. 
Perhaps, as my name was Knox, my godfathers and 
godmothers may have called me Candida in some 
spirit of pedantic punning. Anyhow, my name 
sounds like White Night.” 

“ That is very pretty indeed,” said Swift. “ Can- 
dida Knox — White Night. I need not look for any 
Greek name for you. Rome has given you its best.” 

“ And now,” said Miss Knox, “ that I have told 
you my name, tell me yours — tell me of yourself.” 

He told her. In the shadow of the grotesque 
warriors, whose existence they both calmly ignored 
for the rest of that afternoon, he told all she wanted 
to know of himself, of his life, of his plans. He 
did not notice then that she heard the announce- 
ment of his name as one hears a statement with 
which one is already familiar. He did notice that 
she showed a real interest in his work, in his view 
of life, in his aims and hopes — a real knowledge 


NOX MIHI CANDIDA. 


115 


of the Cry for Liberty. After she had learned of 
him, she let him learn of her. It seemed that she 
was alone in the world ; that she had a little money, 
just enough to live very quietly upon ; that it was 
her dream and her determination to live her own 
life in her own way, to be free and independent and 
self-content. 

“ I want to learn the lesson of the world after my 
own fashion,” she said. “ The lives of most women, 
like the lives of most men, are cramped, imprisoned, 
pitiable. They see nothing for themselves, do noth- 
ing for themselves, think out nothing for themselves. 
I want to become wise, if wisdom is to be won, 
through my own experience, not through the axioms 
of my elders and the printed pages of people who 
write. Other girls in my place might become gov- 
ernesses or telegraph clerks, or go on the stage, or 
go farther and fare worse in any of the routines open 
to the poor woman, the unprotected woman. I want 
something freer, fuller, wider than that.” 

Swift remembered afterwards that he had written 
something very like this in his Cry for Liberty. Now 
it only rejoiced him to think that Candida Knox 
shared his views. 

“ You are very wise,” he said. 

The girl looked at him for a moment thought- 
fully and then shook her head. 

“ I don’t know that I am very wise,” she said. 


tl 6 A woman of impulse. 

but I mean to go on until I learn whether I am 
wise or foolish. I want to live my own life, and I 
am lucky to be able to do it. I begin the game 
at least without prejudices. If I had prejudh^es I 
should not have spoken to you, and we should not 
be sitting here now, side by side, telling each other 
fairy stories.” 

“ Fairy stories ! ” said Swift reproachfully. 

“ Ah, well,” she said, “ all life is more or less of 
a fairy tale, even the life we have lived, and assur- 
edly the life we dream of living. Once upon a 
time there was a girl named Candida Knox, who 
was poor and independent and headstrong, and who 
chose to live by herself and see what came of it. 
There is your orthodox beginning for the fairy tale 
of an unconventional young woman.” 

“ Once upon a time,” said Swift, tuning his 
thoughts to her humor, “ there was a young man 
named Brander Swift, who was poor and and inde- 
pendent and headstrong, and who chose to live by 
himself and see what came of it. Don’t you think 
that the hero of my story and the heroine of your 
story might make very good friends ? ” 

“ I think they might,” she answered gravely. 
There was no one in the little room, and she held 
out her hand to him impulsively as an ardent youth 
might do in response to another youth’s proffer of 
friendship. 


NOX MIHl CANDIDA. 


117 


Swift took her hand and held it firmly, and 
looked into the blue eyes that met his glance so 
composedly. The queer smile of Achilles might 
well have deepened if he could have understood 
the comedy. 

“ Thank you,” said Swift — “ thank you. I will 
say with Dante, ‘ Here beginneth the new Life.’ ” 

“ Say it for yourself, if you like,” said Candida, 
“ but do not let us hamper our friendship by think- 
ing of what some one else said or did in some other 
century. It is what we say and do that touches 
us, and we don’t need the salt of some other man’s 
speech to make our lives palatable.” 

“You are quite right,” said Swift. “The curse 
of the age is quotation.” 

But he had colored slightly at Candida’s words, 
and she noticed it, and said very gently : 

“ I must always speak my mind ; it is one of the 
rules in my game of life. You may say what you 
like to me, save one thing.” 

“ What is that ? ” Swift asked. 

The girl got up from her seat, and he rose also. 

“ That I will tell you some other time,” she said, 
“ if we are indeed going to be friends.” 

“ If we are going to be friends. Are we not 
friends already ? ” 

Swift’s voice was quite pathetic in its appeal, for 
he felt as if this girl who had come so suddenly 


ii8 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


into his life might depart from it just as suddenly. 
She laughed at his earnest tones, but the laugh was 
not unkindly. 

“Yes, I think we are friends,” she said. “ But 
friends part, and I must be going home.”^^ 

“ When shall we meet again ? ” Swift asked eag- 
erly. 

Her face grew grave again, but her eyes still 
smiled. 

“You really wish that we should meet again ? 
Well, I will come here again to-morrow for another 
lesson.” 

“ In Greek art ? ” said Swift. 

“ In life,” said the girl. 


CHAPTER XI. 


THE PLEASURES OF FRIENDSHIP. 

They swore to be friends forever, 

Eternally hand and glove ; 

They thought themselves mightily clever — 

And then they fell in love. 

A Pastoral in Pink, 

T hose who have read the Letters of Pertinax 
will remember how that philosopher and 
cynic defines friendship between man and 
woman as the first chapter of a folly or the last 
chapter of a lament. But cynics are not always 
in the right of it, and Swift, who was no cynic, had 
always cherished some very fine ideas about friend- 
ship, which he had plumped with many other ideas 
into his Cry for Liberty. He had even gone so far 
as to cite with approval the theory of the young 
St. Just, who was one of his heroes, and whose por- 
trait adorned the walls of the Cordeliers’ Club, that 
it would be well for the State to formally abolish 
love and set up friendship in its stead. Now it 
seemed as if Fate was according to him what it does 
not always accord to philosophers, the opportunity 
of putting his theory into practice. 

119 


120 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ With some folk,” said Pertinax, “ friendship is 
a river that widens slowly and surely from its 
source to the sea. With others it is a village brook 
that answers to every external influence, to the 
breath of every breeze, the passing of every cloud, 
that glitters in the sunshine and shivers in the rain, 
and is the first to freeze in winter. With others, 
again, it is like a mountain tarn, darkly deep, silent, 
unconscious. Yet again, with others it is like some 
mighty flood that sweeps over every obstacle and 
covers a ruined country with a great sheet of water 
like a sea, but which in time subsides and leaves 
desolation as the only trace of its passage. With 
others, again, and these perhaps the happiest, it is 
like to some volcanic lake : yesterday it was not, 
to-day it is ; it comes in one mighty moment, swift 
and irresistible as the flood, but, unlike the flood, 
it comes to stay.” 

If Swift had read the Letters of Pertinax^ he 
would have accepted the latter parable as symbolic 
of his state. His friendship for Candida — in the 
core of his heart he called it his love for Candida — 
had altered the world for him, and had altered it 
for good. If he got to know Candida better in 
the days that drifted by, the days that made their 
friendship dearer to him did not seem to make it 
older. He felt that they were old friends on the 
day when she kept her tryst with him by the pillar 


THE PLEASURES OF FRIENDSHIP. 121 


of the Ephesian Eros, the day when he first learned 
what her name was and learned where she lived. 

“ Do not think me presuming,’’ Swift had pleaded 
on that fair first day, “ if I ask to be allowed to 
walk with you as far as your home.” 

“ It is not much to grant,” said Candida, “ for 
I live quite close at hand. Come, by all means.” 

They walked again through the long galleries 
and out of the Museum into the bright April sun- 
shine. Such talk as they had on the way had 
turned again upon the objects around them ; they 
even talked as if they feared a reaction of silence 
after so much confidence. Candida was right when 
she said that she had not far to go. After they left 
the gates they crossed Great Russell Street and en- 
tered Bury Street. Here, at the doorway of one of 
the sets of flats in that street, Candida stopped. 

She held out her hand ; Swift took it for a mo- 
ment. In another moment she had entered the 
doorway and disappeared from his sight, but he 
heard the quick sound of her feet as they ran up 
the stone steps. He stood still for a moment, then 
he turned and walked away with a head humming 
with delicious exaltation. He felt as if he were the 
king of all the world because he had found a friend 
in a beautiful, audacious woman. 

Under the spell of this sweet unreason he could 
not rest, could not settle down to the solemnities 


122 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


of study, could not surrender himself to stupefac- 
tion in the dust of Homeric commentary. So he 
walked over to the Windovers. 

Windover had not yet made up his mind about 
the Pine Hill election. In fact, it seemed that 
there was no need for an immediate decision. The 
sitting member had not yet sent in his application 
for the Chiltern Hundreds, had not yet, it seems, 
definitely decided to do so. It depended a good 
deal upon some consultation of doctors who should 
definitely pronounce upon the state of his health. 
So much Windover had learned in a letter from 
Rockielaw, and he seemed rather pleased than 
pained at a delay which postponed the necessity 
for a momentous decision. He had also received 
a letter from Gabriel Oldacre, from Constantinople, 
full of interesting news of that marvellous city and 
of the doings of Amber Pasha. Anthony read the 
letter aloud to Swift, and as it attracted him, An- 
thony told him of the romance of Gabriel’s life, of 
his love for Dorothy Perceval, who had given her 
love to Harry Chandos, and how in his despair he 
had consented to accompany Amber Pasha to Con- 
stantinople, where he had stayed ever since. 

And Swift, listening, and flushed with the favor 
of his new fortune, felt a pity for the man he did 
not know, and echoed Anthony’s “ Poor devil ! ” 
sympathetically. 


THE PLEASURES OF FRIENDSHIP. 1 23 

Then the talk drifted backward from Constanti- 
nople to Pine Hill, and from Pine Hill to London, 
and from London in general to that particular por- 
tion of London which was known by the name of 
St. Ethelfreda’s Without. 

“ Erastus Albany came to see me yesterday,” 
Windover said. “ He came because he was getting 
up some entertainment at Brisbane Hall, and hoped 
that Lucilla would sing at it. I believe he wishes 
to make a kind of variety show of it, like a music- 
hall. You don’t sing any comic songs, do you, 
Brander ? ”* 

The thought of his friend the snake-charmer 
came into Swift’s mind. He might probably be 
induced to exhibit his wizardries for the entertain- 
ment of St. Ethelfreda’s Without. Swift had a re- 
gard for Erastus Albany, whose Christian socialism 
was not wholly unacceptable to the Cordeliers, and 
he would always be glad to do him a service. Per- 
haps a certain curiosity to see Mr. Brass again 
entered into Swift’s motive ; at all events, he re- 
solved to make the experiment. 

After awhile, when Swift guessed that Windover 
would wish to get to his desk, he got up and said 
good-bye. He left the house as he always left it, 
with a not ungenerous envy of its calm and its 
content. At former times he had asked himself 
whether, after all, there might not be other things 


124 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


in life besides translating German scholars and 
haranguing the Cordeliers. And after asking, he 
had generally dismissed the question and gone back 
to his Cordeliers and gone back to his German 
scholars. But now he put to himself the same 
question and gave himself a very different answer 
than acquiescence. There were other things in 
life than German scholarship and Cordeliers con- 
troversies ; there were better things — there were 
beauty and love, and a girl called Candida. And 
he repeated the name Candida over and over again 
as he went his way, and seemed to find it sweeter 
with every repetition. 

He had left the Windovers with the determina- 
tion to try and find Mr. Brass’ house, and if pos- 
sible Mr. Brass. He had no great difficulty in 
tracking his way to the dingy unlovely crescent in 
which the dingy unlovely house stood. When he 
had quitted it on that eventful evening he had taken 
note of its bearings, and now he found that his 
memory carried him without much fault through 
the dreary streets to the dingy crescent and the 
dingy house. It looked strangely dead in the day- 
light, for every window was shuttered from base- 
ment to garret, and the playfulness of the nomad 
youth of the neighborhood had asserted itself by 
breaking all the panes of glass that stone, propelled 
by hand or sling, could reach, Hardly a trace of 


THE PLEASURES OF FRIENDSHIP. 12$ 


paint remained on the dismal door. If it ever had 
a knocker, the knocker had been wrenched away 
long before, and time and weather had effaced even 
the marks that showed where it had been affixed. 
There was a hole at the side for a bell-pull, a hole 
like a wound, but there was no bell-handle, and 
though there was a bell-handle rocking on the area 
railing, it rocked aimlessly, for it had no chain. 
The dirty pillars of the absurd porch, those pillars 
of that porch which had sheltered Swift a week 
earlier, had flaked their stucco away in ragged 
seams through which the fallacious brickwork 
grinned ghastly at the exposure of its cheat. It 
seemed to Swift that he had seldom seen so 
wretched a sight, and he likened it to the Abomi- 
nation of Desolation spoken of by Daniel the 
prophet. Was it possible that such a sordid, aban- 
doned exterior was the shell for such fantastic 
splendor and such strange inmates ? 

There was an ugly sense of something like en- 
chantment about the place which forced upon 
Swift an odd boyish temptation to take to his 
heels and run away as children run from things un- 
canny. But he had come to see Mr. Drass, and he 
meant to see him if he could, so after a few mo- 
ments of hesitation he drummed sharply on the 
panels of the door with the knob of his stick. The 
sounds seemed to reverberate drearily through 


126 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


empty echoing spaces and die away into silence. 
They brought no response, so he tapped again and 
again yet with no greater success. But the pecul- 
iar method of his knocking arrested the attention 
of idle passers-by, and collected a little cloud of star- 
ing children from adjacent gutters, who eyed him 
curiously, taking him for a madman or a baffled 
tax-collector. Then a slatternly woman came out 
into the neighboring area and looked up sourly at 
Swift, and Swift asked her civilly if she could tell 
him when Mr. Drass would be back ; to which the 
woman answered that she knew nothing about him, 
and had no cause to, thank heaven ! and that it 
was none of her business to poke her nose into her 
neighbors’ affairs. So Swift came down the steps 
again and pushed his way through the little crowd 
that seemed reluctant to let him depart so soon, 
and resentful of the curtailment of their amuse- 
ment. A little farther on Swift came upon a po- 
liceman who, questioned, was willing enough to 
talk, but could tell Swift little. The house belonged 
to an old gentleman who lived mostly abroad ; it 
was occupied from time to time by different kinds 
of people who always seemed to be foreigners, but 
who never did anything suspicious. Often it was 
unoccupied for months and months at a stretch. 
That was all the policeman knew. Swift slipped a 
shilling into the hand of his informant and went 


THE PLEASURES OE FRIENDSHIP. 122 

his way. He had done his best to find Mr. Brass, 
and it was not his fault if the entertainment given 
by the Rev. Erastiis Albany to the people of St. 
Ethelfreda’s Without lacked the attraction of a 
snake-charmer from the Indies. 


CHAPTER XII. 


SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT. 

The world appears a gallant place 
To him that loves a lovely face ; 

The sunlight seems to him more fair 
Touching the tresses of her hair ; 

And in the candor of her eyes 
He finds the earthly Paradise. 

A Pastoral in Pink. 

T he days danced by, a delirium, a rapture. 
The British Museum became to Brander 
Swift as the very Temple of Gnidus. In 
his imagination it took to itself all the attributes 
of beauty and sanctity from its association with 
Candida. While they wandered together side by 
side through its long galleries he was indeed in 
outward form actively engaged in telling his com- 
panion all that she wanted to know — and she wanted 
to know much — about the antique world, about 
that Athens which he knew so much better than 
he knew London, and yet which, with a curious 
irony, he seemed to care for now chiefly because it 
had the good fortune to interest Candida Knox. 
He had devoted his life to the ‘Service of the Greeks 
128 


SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT. 1 29 

in order that he might answer a few questions asked 
by a beautiful girl, and it did not occur to him for 
a moment that there was anything disproportionate 
between the cause and the effect. 

It was lucky for Swift, while this romantic mood 
was upon him, that he was in a great degree his 
own master. If he chose to let his work drift while 
he danced attendance upon a pretty girl, that was, 
in the main, his own affair. He was responsible to 
no one ; his work was bound by no fixed times or 
conditions ; his scholarship, like skilled artisanship, 
could always command employment. In his recent 
years of simplicity and severe work he had saved 
much more money than he spent, and he had in his 
bank a modest sum to his name, which made him 
now feel as independent as if he were a millionaire. 
Swift did not deliberately reason out his position 
in this way ; he simply felt that he was free, that 
the most beautiful woman in the world was willing 
to call him friend, and that to be with her was the 
best thing in the world, and to think of her when 
he was not with her the next best thing. Candida 
had come very suddenly into his life ; she might 
vanish from his life again as suddenly. He did not 
care to dwell upon that possibility. In the mean- 
time she was here, and she seemed to like him, and 
nothing else was worth a thought. 

Through all an enchanted week he had seen her 
9 


130 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


every day ; but only at the Museum, where they 
wandered together for hours, looking at the treas- 
ures, and talking about them or about themselves. 
But afterwards they met elsewhere. For on the 
sixth day of their strange fantastic friendship Swift 
asked her if he might ever come and see her. 

If it was a bold request, he did not feel bold as 
he made it. It had become so natural, even in 
those few days, to see Candida daily, to walk with 
her, talk with her, that their friendship seemed al- 
ready to have endured through the ages. And it 
was very much with the same feeling in which he 
would have asked some man whom he had met and 
liked if he might come and see him, that Swift 
asked this favor of Candida Knox. For though he 
was more devoted to her and her beauty with every 
passing day, he had kept his devotion to himself ; 
at least, so far as saying nothing about it went. A 
man often thinks that because he is silent he has 
not betrayed himself. Besides, Candida’s divine 
frankness did not seem to invite utterances of de- 
votion. 

“ If I let you come and see me,” she answered, 
“ it must be on one well-understood, well-observed 
condition. I am not conventional, and I do not 
see why you should not come and see me as you 
would come to see some man — why I should not 
welcome you as I should welcome some woman.” 


SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT. 13I 

She paused again. Swift hastened to agree with . 
her theory — her theory, that had always been his 
theory. 

‘‘Of course not. We are true comrades. We 
are none the less comrades because I am a man, 
because you are a beautiful woman.” 

“ That is just it,” she said. “ Let me admit, for 
the sake of the argument, that I really am what you 
are good enough to call me, a beautiful woman. 
Now, don’t interrupt me ” — for Swift was about to 
speak — “I know I am not ill-favored. You will 
remember that I told you the other day that there 
was one thing I did not wish you ever to talk to me 
about.” 

“Yes,” said Swift, “I remember.” 

“ Don’t think,” Candida went on, “ that I mind 
your letting me know that you think me beautiful, 
now and then, if you really do think so, and if it 
gives you any pleasure to let me know that you 
think so. I am a woman, if an unconventional 
woman, and I like flattery sometimes and from some 
people. But it is perfectly possible that if you are 
pleased with my face you might fall in love with 
me, or think that you had fallen in love with me. 
At least the thing is not impossible.” 

“ No,” said Swift, “ the thing is not impossible.” 

“Well,” she said, “ I want you to understand at 
once that I do not wish you to make love to me. 


132 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


We are friends, not lovers ; let us remain friends. 
If you were to fall in love with me it would be 
neither my fault nor your fault ; but if it should 
happen, don’t tell me about it. If I make you my 
friend, it is because I prize your friendship, because 
I believe that friendship is possible between a man 
and a woman, because you believe so too.” 

“ Of course,” Swift assented, somewhat sadly. 
He could not deny his own theory — the theory that 
he exposed at length in several of the most elo- 
quent pages of the Cry for Liberty. But he did 
not feel quite as confident now in its universal ap- 
plication. 

“ You must not think me vain if I talk like this,” 
she said. “ I do not say that you will fall in love 
with me. But it is possible that you might fall in 
love with me, as it is possible that I might fall in 
love with you.” 

Though she spoke these words as composedly as 
if she was discussing some abstract question of no 
immediate concern to any one, a flame seemed to 
pass over Swift as she spoke, and to burn out his 
strength, so that he trembled and felt faint. He 
turned to her. 

“ Is that possible,” he stammered, gazing with 
eager eyes upon her beautiful composed face. 

“ Why not,” she answered calmly. “ The one 
thing is as possible as the other. But I don’t want 


SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT. 1 33 

either to happen — at least, for the present. Perhaps 
I prize your friendship too highly to put it in peril. 
Anyhow, I am a woman, and a woman is privileged 
to offer her friendship under conditions, and these 
are my conditions. I will be your friend with all \ 
my heart, and there ’s my hand upon it ; but we 
must be friends, not fools. Give me your promise 
that you will not make love to me, either spoken or 
unspoken, and we shall be the best friends in the 
world.” 

She held out her hand, but he hesitated for a 
moment to take it. She saw his hesitation. 

I read somewhere once,” she said with a smile, 
“that between a man and a woman friendship is 
better than love — better, nobler, braver.” 

Swift knew very well where she might have seen 
such a theory, for he had formulated it himself in 
that terrible Cry for Liberty^ and had been very 
proud of it at the time. He did not feel quite so , 
proud of it now, which is sometimes the way of 
philosophers when their theories come home to 
roost. 

“ Don’t you think that you are rather hard upon 
me,” he asked, somewhat piteously, “ in binding 
me down by such a hard and fast promise as that 
is ? ” 

“ No,” she said slowly, “ we have only been 
friends for a few days, and it ought not to be difh- 


134 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


cult for you to make such a promise now. It is 
quite possible that you think yourself to be in love 
with me at this moment. Without vanity, I should 
not be surprised if you thought so.’^ 

“ I don’t think so,” Swift said beneath his 
breath, with a stress upon the verb which was to 
show his certainty of his state. 

Candida went on with her homily. 

‘‘ My face pleases you, my frankness interests 
you — there is something unexpected about this 
sudden friendship which charms while it amazes 
you. But neither charm nor amazement makes up 
love, though the one is love’s herald and the other 
love’s pursuivant. But I may soften my condition 
thus far. Promise not to make love to me until — 
until I give you permission. There, it is either 
your hand on that or your hand in farewell.” 

But there was no trace of sentiment in her voice 
and no look of sentiment in her eyes. 

“Very well,” he said, “ I promise.” 

“ That is good,” Candida said. “ We shall be 
the best friends in the world now. And now I want 
you to tell me the story you promised me yester- 
day, the story from Herodotus.” 

Swift plunged into Herodotus, and told the 
promised story. But he had his reward, for when 
they left the Museum Candida asked him if he 
would like to come in and have tea with her. 


CHAPTER XIII. 


TO BE OR NOT TO BE. 

Now Fortune, like the phantom in the tale, 

Stands and allures me with a laurel wreath. 

The which she bids me bind upon my brows 
And wear in honor. Shall I for this crown 
Forsake my vineyards and my fruitful fields, 

Woods, lawns, and waters, and my perfect peace? 

The Duke of Attica. 

T he days that immediately succeeded the 
letter of Colonel Rockielaw were days of 
much mental searching on the part of the 
two Windovers. To enter Parliament or not to 
enter Parliament, that was the question. It really 
seemed that if Windover choose he had only to ask 
and have. The question was whether he should 
ask and have or no. They discussed the subject 
at breakfast. They went for a walk in Regent’s 
Park, and discussed it as they wandered beneath 
its trees and by its waters. They discussed it again 
at luncheon, and after luncheon, as they sat by the 
fire ; they allowed their favorite books to lie un- 
heeded on their laps while they again exercised 
135 


136 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


their minds over the familiar course. It was char- 
acteristic of the youthfulness with which Lucilla 
and her husband persisted in regarding the world 
and its phenomena that they found a childish en- 
joyment in their game of speculation, and that 
ever and anon, when their doubts were keenest 
and their faces gravest, that they would be both 
seized by a sense of the humors of the situation, 
and begin to laugh like children. And yet, as 
Windover profoundly observed, it was no laughing 
matter. Upon their decision — for Windover had 
no idea of deciding either way without the full 
concurrence of his wife — much must and more 
might depend. 

Many days went by in these agitations and per- 
plexities — agitations that followed Windover to his 
desk and danced impish dances between him and 
the paper that waited to receive his opinions on 
passing events ; perplexities that pursued Lucilla 
in all her housewifely occupations, buzzing in her 
ears like a swarm of summer flies. At the end of 
several days neither husband nor wife had ad- 
vanced at all nearer towards a definite decision. 

“ If this uncertainty goes on much longer,” An- 
thony would exclaim in simulated despair, “ I shall 
grow gray.” 

And Lucilla, imitating his mood, would assert 
that unless they settled the problem one way or 


TO BE OR NOT TO BE. 


37 


the other she would grow wrinkled and old before 
her time. Whereupon Windover would immedi- 
ately kiss her, and they would both start laughing, 
only to grow serious again and pucker their brows 
over the problem. 

A new day dawned and found them still unde- 
cided. Windover racked himself between duty 
and inclination, argued with duty and inclination. 
Duty to his cause and the inclination for practical 
politics which is so often the passion of the theo- 
retical politician urged him to accept. Duty 
towards Lucilla and inclination for his quiet life 
urged him to decline. Lucilla, who was as fretted 
as he, would probably have come to a decision 
sooner if it had been left to her, though as it was 
not left to her she really had no definite idea what 
the decision would be. The one thing she feared 
was forcing her husband to either action against 
his secret wishes, and so she watched him as a 
sailor watches the sky for decisive weather signals. 
And Windover could not make up his mind. 

“ If this goes on much longer,” said Lucilla, half 
laughing and half crying, on one of these mornings 
of doubt and of deliberation, “ I shall become quite 
pettish, quite peevish, quite fractious, run all the 
gamut that leads from nervousness at the one end 
of the scale to downright bad temper on the 
other.” 


138 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

“ It is very trying,” Windover confessed ; “ 1 
begin to feel rather irritable myself. Confound 
that fellow ! I wish he had never come here to 
bother us. I have a great mind to ” 

“To what ? ” asked Lucilla. 

“To make up my mind one way or the other,” 
Windover answered, and pretended to immerse 
himself in the Times. 

“Yes, but which way .?” said Lucilla, and Win- 
dover, with a comic groan, answered : 

“ There thou hast me.” 

During luncheon Windover and Lucilla were os- 
tentatiously scrupulous in avoiding any reference 
To the subject which was harassing them. When 
luncheon was over they both went into the gar- 
den, and Anthony smoked cigarettes, and pro- 
pounded theories of art, and looked at the vines 
that were trailed upon the high walls, and prophe- 
sied that if this fine weather held they would soon 
begin to burgeon. Lucilla walked beside him, 
apparently absorbed in viniculture, and her three 
cats and her dog gambolled in the sunshine and 
chased each other round the fountain. It was very 
Arcadian and quiet, for the garden was a large one 
and little overlooked, and the big chesnut-trees 
and plane-trees served as an effective screen against 
the neighbors. 

Suddenly the quiet was disturbed. The dog 


TO BE OR NOT TO BE. 


139 


began to bark, the cats scattered for cover in all 
directions, as the maid appeared through the open 
winnow-doors closely followed by a man whose tall 
form and soldierly bearing had been familiar in the 
thoughts of both Windover and Lucilla for many 
days. The maid disappeared, Lucilla called to the 
dog to be quiet, and husband and wife advanced 
across the garden to meet and greet the advancing 
Colonel Rockielaw. 

Colonel Rockielaw seemed brisker, more viva- 
cious, more like the leader of a storming party than 
ever. 

“ Well,” he said, after he had taken the hands of 
husband and wife victoriously — “ well, I hope you 
have decided, and decided in the right way.” 

The Windovers were silent, and their silence 
seemed to perturb their questioner, for he glanced 
from one to the other with an expression of uncon- 
cealed chagrin. 

Come,” he said sadly, “ you don’t mean to tell 
me ” 

He paused ; his disappointment seemed to be 
too much for him. Windover felt that he must say 
something. 

“ Well, you see,” he began almost apologetically, 
the fact is ” 

But what the fact was Colonel Rockielaw did not 
give him time to say. 


140 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Sorry to interrupt you,” he said. “ But before 
you go any further let me ask you one simple ques- 
tion. Do you know anything of a man of the name 
— the absurd name — of Budget ? ” 

Anthony and Lucilla involuntarily glanced at 
each other. 

“You do,” said the Colonel ; “I perceive that 
you do.” 

“Yes,” said Windover ; “we certainly have a 
friend of the name of Budget — Mr. Stephen Bud- 
get. But I do not quite see ” 

“ What he has to do with this matter,” said the 
Colonel. “Well, there I agree with you ; neither 
do I. But Mr. Budget — yes, his name was Stephen 
— seems to think differently from both of us.” 

“ How do you mean ? ” asked Lucilla. 

“Mean, my dear madam?” 'said the Colonel. 

^ “ Why, simply this : did you give this fellow. Bud- 
get — excuse me, if he is a friend of yours, for call- 
ing him this ‘ fellow ’ ; but that is how he presents 
himself to my mind — did you give this person 
Budget any authority to act in any way on your 
behalf in this matter ? ” 

“ Certainly not,” said both Anthony and Lucilla, 
speaking together with the precision and decision 
of a chorus. 

“ I thought not,” said Colonel Rockielaw, “ I 
felt sure not. He did n’t seem to be the kind of 


TO BE OR NOT TO BE. 14I 

person — excuse me again ; if he is a friend of 
yours he is a friend of yours, and no more words 
about it — but he did not really seem to me to be 
the kind of person whom you would authorize to 
act in any kind of delicate negotiations.” 

“ I most certainly should not,” said Windover, 
“ And I should be glad to know how he comes 
into this matter at all.” 

“ Certainly,” said Colonel Rockielaw. “ This 
fellow — I beg pardon, this Mr. Stephen Budget — 
came to me the other day, called upon me at the 
club. He sent up a note to me in which he 
asked for the favor of a few minutes’ interview. 
He said in his note that it concerned the election, 
and he mentioned your name as a great friend of 
his.” 

Windover frowned slightly. Lucilla frowned 
strongly. The Colonel went on with his narrative. 

“ Of course the mention of your name would 
have been enough for me at any time, but the 
mention of your name coupled with the election 
convinced me that it must be something of the 
utmost importance. So I saw your friend in the 
Strangers’ Room of the club.” 

Windover said nothing, but he looked a little 
pale. Lucilla leaned forward eagerly, and spurred, 
the Colonel’s speech with an interrogative “ Well ? ” 

“ I do not wish to say anything uncomplimentary 


142 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


about any one whom you have honored with your 
friendship,” said Colonel Rockielaw, hesitatingly, 
“ but I must say, frankly, that I was not much im- 
pressed by the man, or, rather, I should say that I 
was, but that my impressions were not very favor- 
able, and my unfavorable impressions were not 
removed when he proceeded to explain himself, 
which, to do him justice, he did without the slight- 
est embarrassment. Indeed, he acted as if he were 
conferring a favor upon me by invading my club 
and my quiet.” 

“ That is very like Stephen,” said Windover with 
a smile, as he pictured to himself the appearance 
of the two men at the interview. 

“ So I should suppose,” said the Colonel — ‘‘ so 
I should suppose. Well, to make a long story short, 
he gave me to understand, after many circumlocu- 
tions, that it was in the highest degree improbable 
that you could be prevailed upon to stand for Par- 
liament.” 

“ How very impertinent of him ! ” said Lucilla. 
Her pretty cheeks were red with anger, and her 
eyes shone. 

“ I cannot understand,” said Windover, “ why 
Stephen took it upon himself to arrange my public 
and private affairs for me in this extraordinary 
manner ?” 

“Can’t you?” said the Colonel. “You will in 


TO BE OR NOT TO BE. 


143 


a minute, for the best, or the worst, of the business 
is still to come. I suggested to Mr. Budget that, 
if you thought public life would be injurious to 
your interests, you would no doubt be able to speak 
for yourself. That was my hint for him to go, but 
instead of taking it, he took me still further into 
his confidence. He was good enough to suggest 
that in the very likely event of your absolutely de- 
clining the olfer that had been made to you, he 
himself, Stephen Budget, would be quite prepared 
to accept the candidature and come forward as the 
champion of our interests.’^ 

“ But this is quite astonishing ! ” said Windover 
— a remark upon which Lucilla commented with 
an indignant “Not at all !” beneath her breath — 

“ Stephen Budget is one of the extremest of ex- 
treme Radicals.’* 

“ Is he ? ” said Colonel Rockielaw. “ Then, he 
is also one of the coolest of cool hands, to come to 
me as he did. If I had known that, I should have ^ 
asked him to step outside the club and have laid 
my rattan across his shoulders in the open street. 
Perhaps it 's not too late now. Do you know the 
rascal’s address ? ” 

Lucilla half closed her eyes as she shaped to 
herself with a certain amusement a picture of the 
scuffle between the big, hard, well-knit soldier and 
the big, loose, flabby Budget. But Windover has- 


144 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


tened to calm the Colonel. Windover was not a 
man who liked scenes of any kind, or the sugges- 
tion of scenes. 

The indignant Colonel so far suffered himself to 
be mollified that he sat down again, and, placing 
his rattan between his knees, folded his hands over 
its gold head, and gazed fixedly at the Windovers. 

“ The question for us to consider now,” he said, 
“ is not what this fellow Budget is, or what this fel- 
low Budget is not. The question is. Are you dis- 
posed to accept our offer ? ” 

And though Windover had not exchanged a word 
or a glance with Lucilla, he knew as well as if they 
had exchanged the inmost ideas of their minds that 
he was only saying what she would wish him to say 
when he returned the Colonel’s fixed gaze and an- 
swered firmly : 

“ I am.” 


CHAPTER XIV. 


THE DAWNING OF THE YEAR. 

Spring is in the air, my darling, 

Spring is everywhere ; 

In the chatter of the starling. 

In the golden air. 

Spring is in the grove whose greenness 

Thinly veils the branches’ leanness — 

Branches lately bare. 

Spring has come at last, my sweeting. 

Earth is mad with spring ; 

Listen to the cuckoo’s greeting 
Hear the swallow’s wing. 

Fireless hearths confound the cricket. 

Nightingales in yonder thicket 
Have begun to sing. 

Songs of Sentiment » 


P OETS have raved about spring ever since 
poets began to rave about anything. But 
the rhapsodies of English poets are too often 
a mockery. Yet there are some seasons, rare and 
precious, when our English spring, that is too often 
churlish, wears a genial face — when March carries 
upon its rugged shoulders the golden mantle of a 
poet’s May, and April laughs like June. So it was 


146 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

with this year — this year of Swift’s life when all 
the elements seemed to be allied in the purpose of 
making existence an enchantment. The dear days 
of that April were such days as he had never re- 
membered in April before — days of golden sun- 
light, of soft air, days as warm as June, days that 
made all the world wear holiday aspect, days of 
blue skies, of bursting buds, of an atmosphere vi- 
brating with heat. 

The weather that the poets have called the 
weather of the kingfisher stayed and stayed, giv- 
ing its glory to everything, and calling with voice 
upon voice to all lovers of the country life to shake 
the dust of cities from their feet and face the high- 
ways that lead through meadows to woods and lanes 
and waters and the hollows of the hills. 

Swift began to long with a longing that was like 
a sickness to obey those voices, to feel upon his 
cheek the air of the fields, to breathe the odor of 
flowers, to drink from the Fountain of Youth, as 
he always drank when he escaped from the town 
into the country. Of old he would have answered 
the summons instantly — have thrust a book into 
his pocket, flung on his hat, and set out for a day- 
long wander, that brought him back at evening 
footsore, but heart-light, full of memories that en- 
chanted, with cheeks that the sun had tanned, with 
clothes that the dust of many highways, the grass 


THE DAWNING OF THE YEAR. 147 

of many lanes, had stained. For then he was con- 
tent to be alone, to walk where he pleased and 
how he pleased, his own master, with no need of 
other companion than his thoughts or the volume 
in his pocket. But now the voices of the spring 
called upon a changed worshipper. For Swift was 
no longer alone in the world, no longer the austere 
master of his own caprice ; he hungered and thirsted 
for the country as much as ever, but he did not 
wish to taste its joys in solitude. He wanted the 
country, but he also wanted Candida for his compan- 
ion in the country. It was. Oh to walk across a com- 
mon with Candida, to sit with Candida beneath the 
shade of some gracious tree, to hear with Candida 
the first call of the cuckoo — the call that wakens 
at once all that is sylvan in the heart of the man 
whose inmost spirit still remembers the green 
woods ! 

After all, why should it not come to pass ? The 
days as they drifted by in the splendor of their 
sunlight, in the illumination of their gold and color, 
only seemed to make the friendship between Swift 
and Candida more intimate, more exquisite, more 
ideal. Candida accepted the friendship as if it 
had always been portion and parcel of her life ; 
she treated Swift with something of the frankness 
that would have been natural if he had been an- 
other woman or she another man. He, on his 


148 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

part, drunk with delight at the kindliness of her 
comradeship, rejoiced and amazed at the rapture 
of his happiness, forgot, or tried to forget, that 
there was a time when this friendship had never 
been, and exorcised, or tried to exorcise, the 
thought that it could cease. She was willing to 
see him every day, and for a large part of every 
day. He had been allowed to come again and 
again to the little room in Bury Street. 

He suggested to her, diffidently, one afternoon 
early in May, that the weather was too fine to be 
wasted within the walls of even the British Mu- 
seum. 

“ You are fond of walking,” he said. “ Will you 
come for a walk ? I have a vagrant mood upon 
me.” 

She looked thoughtfully at him, and then glanced 
at a casemate in the room in which they were stand- 
ing. The casemate was open, and through its wired 
aperture came a glow of sunlight. There was a 
glimpse of green trees from the neighboring gar- 
dens, and the chatter of birds came pleasantly 
upon the ear. Swift followed the direction of her 
glance. 

“ Does not that tempt you ? ” he asked. “ If that 
square of sunlight and that little glimpse of leaves 
seem so alluring in this old place, how delightful 


THE DAWNING OF THE YEAR. 149 

the country would be ! Let us assume that the 
spirits of the woods and the waters are calling to 
us, and let us obey the summons.” 

“ It would be pleasant,” she said softly — “ very 
pleasant.” 

“ I often take walks by myself,” said Swift, “but 
it would be delightful to have you for my compan- 
ion. I hope you do not think I ought not to ask 
you ? ” 

“ Oh no,” said Candida ; “ we are friends and 
comrades. But where could we go ? ” 

“ Do you know Richmond Park ? ” Swift asked. 

A smile came and went on Candida’s face too 
quickly for Swift to notice it. 

“ Not very well,” she said. 

“ I am awfully fond of it,” said Swift. “ For a 
place so near to town it is full of pastoral possibili- 
ties. I go there very often, and I tell you what I 
often do — and what we might do, if you did n’t 
mind — I take my luncheon with me and eat it in 
the open air. One is as much alone as if one were 
in the backwoods.” 

“ It sounds very pastoral and primitive and pleas- 
ant,” said Candida. There was mirth in her eyes 
and mirth in her voice, but the proposal seemed to 
please her. 

Swift was delighted. 


150 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


This is excellent,” he said. “ I will bring some 
sandwiches and a bottle of claret.” 

“ No,” said Candida ; “ let us divide the burden 
like brothers. You shall bring the claret, and I 
will bring the sandwiches. Besides, I am sure that 
my girl will cut them better than your landlady 
would.” 

So it was all arranged, and Swift prayed for fine 
weather. 

Fine weather was vouchsafed. Fine weather was 
the appanage of that unwonted time when the trees 
wore the green livery of the spring well-nigh a month 
before their custom, when the fervid air seemed to 
belong to the June of the poets, when the laburnum 
blazed in yellow, and the lilac blazed in mauve, and 
the chestnuts showed their great white candles like 
green altars to nature, and the crimson stars of the 
may burned everywhere, and burning filled the air 
with the incense of their strange, sweet scent. 

Pessimists shook their heads over this untimely 
splendor ; they saw in it only the prodigality of the 
spendthrift who squanders his inheritance with 
headlong haste, and they prophesied a dismal sum- 
mer as the penalty for a divine spring. But the 
optimists hoped that this early glory was but the 
herald of happier, hotter days ; and the opportu- 
nists, of whom Swift was one, did not trouble their 


THE DAWNING OF THE YEAR. 151 

heads about either fortune, but accepted with de- 
light the fact of fine weather in season or out of 
season, and were prepared to make the most of it 
and the best of it while it lasted. 

Such was the wise mood in which Swift welcomed 
a wonderful day. 


CHAPTER XV. 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 

Only I lonely long 

For the woodland life, for the strong 
Cry of the cuckoo’s song. 

The Romany Road, 

A t half-past eleven Swift stood at Candida’s 
door, and rang the bell joyously. A small 
bottle of claret, artfully enveloped in brown 
paper, so as to resemble anything save its convivial 
self, occupied one of the roomy pockets of his yel- 
low coat ; a volume of verse occupied the other. 
In honor of the expedition Swift had mounted his 
straw hat, sunburnt with the suns of more than one 
summer, and bound with a plain black ribbon, for 
Swift did not belong to any aquatic or athletic club, 
and could fly no colors. 

Candida opened the door to him herself, and 
Swift thought she looked more enchanting than ever 
as she stood there, framed in the square of the door- 
way, in her very neat, very simple, very dainty dress 
of blue serge, and the cool white blouse beneath 
the little open jacket. 


152 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 


153 


If Swift had been a man experienced in the wear 
of women, he would have admired the perfection 
with which the plain attire was made, and the mod- 
ishness of the small straw hat that crowned Can- 
dida’s dark hair. But he was not, and he only 
thought that she looked very nice, which, indeed, 
he would probably have thought if she had come to 
greet him garbed in an old flour-sack. Candida 
held a small square brown^ paper packet dangling 
by a string-loop from her finger. 

“ I was resolved not to keep you waiting for a 
second,” Candida said, “ and so I came to the door 
to be ready for you. The virtue of punctuality 
should not be the privilege of man. Here are the 
sacred sandwiches.” 

Swift laughed and took the packet from her, and 
she drew the door to behind her. 

“ We have plenty of time,” he said as they went 
down the stone stairs. “ But it is very good of you 
to be punctual, none the less.” 

When they got into Oxford Street, Swift was for 
calling a cab to drive them to Charing Cross, but 
Candida would not hear of this piece of extrava- 
gance. 

“ We have plenty of time to walk,” she said ; 
“ therefore let us walk. Poor people like us cannot 
afford to spend money in that reckless way.” 

“ But won’t you be tired ? ” Swift asked dubi- 


154 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


ously. “ Remember that there is plenty of walk- 
ing to do at the other end of our train journey.” 

“ So much the better,” said Candida. “We are 
going a-walking ; let us get all the walking we can. 
It will do us both good, and I think you will find 
that I am not easily fatigued. Remember that I 
am a country girl.” 

So it was settled, and they walked along briskly 
towards Charing Cross in the best of spirits. The 
sun was bright, and made even the sordid streets 
look cheerful, for your sun is the best beautifier in 
the world and of the world, and the man and wo- 
man were as merry as a boy and girl. More than 
one of those whom they passed on their way looked 
with admiration at the beautiful girl in her simple, 
admirable attire, and looked with amazement at 
her companion in his yellow suit and his old sun- 
burnt straw hat. But if Candida noticed the ad- 
miration or the amazement, she showed no sign of 
notice ; and as for Swift, he noticed nothing but 
his companion, thought of nothing but the fair 
fortune of the fair day. 

At Charing Cross they caught a Metropolitan 
train to Putney. 

Candida seemed to take the liveliest interest in 
everything that was to be seen from the windows 
of the carriage — the changing types of houses, the 
steady, merciless advance of brick and mortar upon 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 


155 


what once had been smiling fields, the growing 
sense of a cleaner, more countrified air, as the 
train crossed the river. He had never seen her so 
merry, in such high spirits, in all their infinite, in- 
timate friendship, which was now some sweet weeks 
old. Her child-like mirthfulness made her young 
beauty seem yet younger, and its influence was de- 
liciously contagious, bringing out in Swift all that 
was most brightly boyish in his unsophisticated 
nature. He felt quite sorry when the train came 
to East Putney, and was only able to console him- 
self by remembering that the delight of the day 
was now to come, the delight of the walk with 
Candida. 

And it was a pleasant walk. First through the 
Putney street and the wide way of Putney Hill. 
Then across Putney Common, with its first fair 
breath of wildness after the servility of the aban- 
doned, well-nigh forgotten city. Then the com- 
ing on the Portsmouth Road, with all the rich 
suggestions and imaginings that the union of those 
two simple words afforded — suggestions and imagi- 
nings of an earlier day when the history of Europe 
seemed to start from Portsmouth Hard, and when 
the demigod adventurers travelled post chaise from 
the great city to the great sea-port to fight the 
French and find eternal glory. Then to come on 
Wimbledon Common, with its illustrious windmill 


156 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


holding its gaunt vanes to the soft sky, and the 
grayness of the common’s tone dotted with the 
scarlet points of the golfers’ coats. And so on, on 
by the gallant winding road past modern villas 
hideous in their modernity, and past old houses 
that seemed as if they must in their day have been 
honest coaching inns, their bar-parlors not unfa- 
miliar to highwaymen ; by trim gardens and spread- 
ing fields, until they came to the funny little row 
of modest suburban houses which, as Swift knew, 
announced the immediate nearness of the Park. 
The little houses were all very neat, and their .tiny 
front gardens won the admiration of Candida, be- 
cause of the brave show they made in flowers of 
the simpler favor. But they did not linger long 
over these modest houses. A few paces more and 
Swift turned his companion to the right, and they 
passed through the Robin Hood Gate of Richmond 
Park. ' 

“ ‘ Now are we in Arden ! ’ ” cried Swift joyously, 
waving his hand towards the tall elms as if to con- 
gratulate them upon the advent of divinity. 

Divinity looked up at him and laughed. 

“ Please do not finish the quotation,” she said, 
“ unless you be indeed of the Touchstone humor. 
‘ Marry the greater fool I ! When I was at home 
I was in a better place.’ ” 

Swift reddened slightly, and laughed too. 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 


157 


** That was the folly of a motley fool ! ” he said. 
‘‘Your coxcomb is no shepherd. Withered brain 
and wry wit are not made for the country life. I 
suppose Touchstone took Audrey back to Court 
with him. I wonder how she liked it ? ” 

“ Oh, famously,” Candida answered. “ She was 
made for the buttery hatch and chaffer with pages 
and men at arms. I doubt if she ever sent back a 
sigh towards Arden.” 

“ Perhaps not,” said Swift. “ Perhaps nobody 
ever loves the country so well as those who were 
born to cities. To me this place seems like the 
Earthly Paradise after Queen Square.” 

They were walking under the great trees skirting 
the wall that divides the Park from Kingston Vale. 
The withered bracken of the dead year crackled 
beneath their feet. Here and there, through the 
dry earth and the dead leaves, the pale green fronds 
of new ferns began to peep, called into life by the 
lovely spring. In front of them the ground was a 
network of burrows, in and out of which the quick, 
darting rabbits played or stood still with long ears 
lifted, watching the visitors’ approach, and disap- 
pearing like bubbles as the human steps drew 
nearer. Above their heads a colony of rooks 
cawed vociferously in the swaying tree-tops. In 
the distance Swift pointed out to Candida a herd 
of dappled deer moving slowly across a green lawn. 


158 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Ihe antlers of the stags rising and falling like the 
lances of a marching army. The woods and the 
open were quick with animal sights and sounds, 
but there were no human beings to be seen. They 
seemed to be as much alone in the beautiful place 
as Adam and Eve in Eden. If it were not for the 
low line of the wall, and the sight of an occasional 
red roof gleaming through the trees beyond it, 
they might have fancied themselves to be in the 
very heart of the country. 

Candida smiled up at him in sympathy with his 
enthusiasm. She was silent for a minute as they 
moved slowly along between the trees, going in a 
direction of which Swift had constituted himself 
the guide. Then she said again : 

“You seem very earnest in your likings. Are 
you always in earnest about everything ? ” 

Swift looked down quickly, with a vague fear 
that she might be laughing at him — a fear that for 
the second made him feel quite sick at heart, and 
that flung a shadow over the bright sky and the 
brave world. But Candida’s face was perfectly 
grave, and her eyes were fixed upon a distant slope. 
He breathed again, and the shadow vanished and 
the sky was as gay, the world as gallant, as 
before. 

“ Of course I am in earnest. What is the good 
of life if one is n’t in earnest about living ? Where 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 


159 


I believe, I believe with all my heart and with all 
my soul ; where I like I like ; where I love, I 
love ” 

He stopped, with the quick color in his cheeks, 
and she finished his sentence for him hurriedly : 

And where you hate, you hate, I suppose ? 
Was that what you were going to say ? ” 

“ I suppose so,” he said slowly. “ I don’t know 
— I don’t think — that I am much of a hater ; at 
least, as far as I myself am concerned. I have 
never had occasion to hate any one. I dare say I 
have disliked people, but hate is a great term, and 
it is a pity to degrade it to a substitute for spite.” 

“ Has n’t somebody said somewhere,” Candida 
asked, “ that those only love well who hate well ? ” 

“It was Dr. Johnson, I think,” Swift answered. 
“ He said a great many things that he did n’t ex- 
actly mean, I fancy. I donh think it is true. I 
hope it is n’t true.” 

“ If any one wronged you very much, do you 
think you could hate them ? ” Candida asked with 
a gravity that defied grammar. 

“ I don’t know,” Swift answered. “ Hate is such 
a hopeless kind of thing nowadays. We don’t fight 
duels, we don’t even hire bravos — and I don’t write 
paragraphs for the papers.” 

“ I don’t think I was thinking of a man,” said 
Candida ; “ I think I was thinking of women. If 


i6o 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


women wronged — if a woman wronged you, could 
you hate her, do you think ? ” 

“ The problem hardly comes within the range of 
practical politics,” Swift said with a laugh ; “but I 
think not — I hope not. A man must be such a 
poor sort of a blackguard to hate a woman, it 
seems to me. What do you say to this tree ? ” 

“ Good-morning, tree,” said Candida, with an 
air of pretty pertness that made Swift shout with 
boyish laughter. 

He had brought their walk to a halt in front of a 
mighty elm whose roots swelled out above the 
surface of the earth and sloped away in graceful 
curves. It was quite a lonely place — a place that 
seemed especially to invite wayfarers to repose. 

“ I am sure the Hamadryad should be grateful 
for your gracious salutation,” said Swift. “ But 
that is not exactly what I meant. I wanted to 
know if you thought this tree would be a pleasant 
kind of camping-ground for us ? ” 

“ Oh, yes ! ” said Candida — “ quite delightful. 
These gnarled roots will make excellent chairs.” 
She sat down on the biggest root, and, leaning 
back against the tree, smiled up at him. “ I feel 
like a very gipsy. Do I look like a gipsy ? ” 

“ If a gipsy,” Swift said, “ then, indeed, the 
queen of the gipsies.” 

Her face suddenly grew grave. 


IN RiCHMONt) RARK. 


i6i 


“Perhaps I should make a good gipsy,” she 
said. “ But if so, I should certainly wish to be 
queen of the gipsies.” 

The vehemencee of her tone, the gravity of her 
voice, of her face, surprised him. 

“ It would scarcely be difficult for you to queen 
it anywhere,” he said. “ But does sovereignty so 
greatly tempt you ? ” 

“ ‘ Better the first man in the village than the 
second man in Rome,’ ” she answered. 

She was merry again, and her eyes mocked him. 

“ The man who said that,” Swift commented, 
“ knew very well in his heart of hearts that he was 
going to be the first man in Rome.” 

“ Very well, said Candida. “ Perhaps I know in 
my heart of hearts that I am going to be ” 

“ Queen of the gipsies ?” Swift suggested. 

He did not mean the words for a challenge, but 
she answered them with as much vivacity as if she 
took them for a challenge. 

“ Queen of the gipsies — queen of something — 
queen of anything — who knows ? But now let us 
talk no more of queens and kings. Are we not 
democrats, you and I — or, at least, equal monarchs 
— here in this lonely woodland ? Fellow-sovereign, 
may I offer you a sandwich ? ” 

Swift took a sandwich and placed it by his side 
on a piece of paper while he proceeded to draw 

II 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


162 

the little bottle of wine. When he had done it he 
drew from another pocket — that yellow coat of his 
was a marvel of pockets — two small glasses, one of 
which fitted into the other, and both of which, 
being of the flattened shape affected by the trav- 
elled, took up but little room. 

Swift filled the larger of the two glasses with the 
red wine, and handed it to his companion. Then 
he filled his own. 

“ I drink,” he said, “ to the queen of the gip- 
sies.” 

And he pledged Candida with his eyes as he 
drank his wine. 

“ And I,” said Candida, “ I drink as the old 
Romans would have drunk, to the genius of this 
place, to the kindly spirit that lingers in these 
woods and grasses, and watches benignly over the 
wanderers who come within its domain.” 

And as she spoke she sipped her wine and her 
eyes laughed at Swift over the edge of the glass. 

“ By all means,” said Swift. “ Genio loci — to 
the genius of this place. I dare swear it has never 
been so saluted before.” And as he spoke he in- 
verted his almost empty glass and allowed a few 
crimson drops to trickle down its sides and drop 
in small splashes upon the dusty soil. “ You see,” 
he said, “ I make libation.” 

Candida followed his example. 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 


163 


They were silent for a little while. 

Swift looked around him complacently, and be- 
gan to murmur to himself a few lines of Greek 
verse. The girl turned sharply and looked at him. 

“ What are you saying ? ” she asked abruptly. 

Swift looked up with a smile, somewhat surprised 
to find her face so set. 

“ I was saying to myself,” he answered, “ some 
lines from the Greek Anthology, lines attributed 
to Plato, in which the singer bids his hearers to 
‘ sit down by this high-leafed, voiceful pine, that 
rustles her branches beneath the western breezes, 
and beside my babbling waters the pipe of Pan 
shall bring drowsiness down upon thy enchanted 
eyelids.’ Are they not delightful ? ” 

Candida moved her head impatiently. 

“ Why must you always quote things ? ” she 
asked. “We seem to live in an age of quotations, 
unable to be anything, to do anything, to enjoy 
anything, unless we can fortify ourselves first by 
repeating like a charm something that some Greek, 
or Roman, or Italian, or Frenchman, or German, 
or Chinese, said before us. Can we not admire a 
fine day in a fair place without dragging in Plato 
to bolster us up in our delight ? We are so dread- 
fully unreal, all of us ; we seem to live in the 
shades of others instead of casting shadows of our 
Qwn,” 


164 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Was it so dreadfully unreal to quote poor old 
Plato ? ” Swift asked. “ The words seemed to 
chime in my mind with the time and the place.” 

“ No, they did n’t,” said the girl decisively. “To 
begin with, we are not sitting under a pine-tree at 
all, but an honest English elm. In the next place, 
we don’t believe in Pan even as your Plato might 
have believed in him ; it ’s only an affectation. In 
the third place, we are not Greeks of Arcady at all, 
but an English man and an English woman sitting 
in a suburban park. It is so far, far better to be a 
real thing than a reflection.” 

“Well,” said Swift, “we are ourselves, we two ; 
we live our own lives after our own fashion, free 
and straightforward. It is not a line from a Greek 
poet that will turn us into hypocrites.” 

The girl’s face was turned away from Swift, and 
he did not see the sadness on it. But as she looked 
round at him now her lips and her eyes were smil- 
ing. 

“ You are quite right,” she said, “ my dear friend, 
and I am a peevish imp to-day. You are as hon- 
est as the day — and I am as honest as the night— 
and between us we may perhaps succeed a little in 
remoulding the world nearer to the heart’s desire. 
Who knows ? ” 

Swift raised himself upon one arm and looked 
eagerly into her eyes. 


IN RICHMOND PARK. 


165 


‘‘What do you mean ? ” he said. 

“ I mean many things, nothing, everything. I 
don’t know what I mean to-day. Come, shall we 
tramp again ? ” 

And Candida rose lightly to her feet. Swift 
sprang up, too, and stood beside her. 

“ Do you mean that perhaps ” he began, but 

the girl checked him. 

“ Remember,” she said, and laid her finger upon 
her lips. Swift inclined his head in a mute repent- 
ance. His pulses, that had begun to beat so hotly, 
flagged again. 


I 


CHAPTER XVI. 


THE HOLLOW PLACE. 

Even Arcady 

Is still a portion of our common earth, 

And those that dwell therein, however blessed, 

Must not be counted as immortal gods. 

But mortals set by danger everywhere. 

Even where the world is greenest. 

Alcibiades — a Cotnedy, 

T T 7 HERE shall we go now ? ” said Candida, 
V V after Swift had restored the glasses to 
his pocket. 

“ If you are not tired " Swift began. 

“ I am never tired ! ” Candida interrupted. 

“ Very well, then, I propose that we go along the 
Park towards Ham Gate, and so by the Common 
to the towing-path and back to Richmond for the 
train. It is a delightful way to walk.” 

“ Excellent. Onward ! ” Candida answered, and 
in another moment they were moving quickly 
through the trees in the direction that Swift had 
proposed. 

Soon the ground sloped a little into a kind of 
x60 


THE HOLLOW PLACE. 


167 


gentle hill. Near the top a tall tree stretched a 
great curved branch across their path. Candida 
gave a little cry of joy. 

“ How delightful ! ” she said ; “ I can just reach 
it.” And before Swift could understand her in- 
tention she had swung herself lightly into the seat 
that the great bough afforded, and began to swing 
herself up and down, pushing the ground with her 
foot every time that the rustling bough came low 
enough to allow her to do so. 

“ Oh, this is delightful ! ” she cried, looking with 
a flushed, laughing face at Swift’s somewhat 
amazed one. “ I feel like a little child again. 
Swing me, please. ‘ Hush-a-bye, baby, on the tree- 
top ; when the wind blows, the cradle will rock.’ ” 

“ ‘ If the bough breaks, the cradle will fall,’ ” 
said Swift, completing the quotation anxiously, as 
he caught hold of one end of the bough and 
scanned it to test its strength. “ Are you sure the 
bough is strong enough ? ” 

“To bear my weight? Thanks for the compli- 
ment. Don’t be afraid. It is strong enough — and 
if it breaks it breaks. ‘ Down will come cradle, 
baby and all.’ ” 

And Candida laughed again as Swift, in obedi- 
ence to her wish, swung his end of the bough, and 
the girl rose and dipped among the green leaves 
like a boat dancing on a green sea. 


1 68 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

It came to Swift, suddenly, that she had never 
seemed so beautiful as she seemed now, swaying 
with a kind of childish rapture with the swaying 
bough, and laughing in harmony with the music 
that the tree made as the motion caused its branches 
to quiver and its leaves to rustle up to the very pin- 
nacle of its woodland pride. She might be a nymph 
of the woods, he thought — something less and more 
than human, one of these mystical creatures who 
haunt the hearts of German forests, and break the 
hearts of hunters, and craze the brains of lonely 
charcoal-burners. He felt a wild longing to clasp 
her in his arms and kiss her, kiss her again and 
again, while he cried out a passion that filled out 
his veins with flame. And yet, even with the 
thought, he felt a greater fear of her, a greater 
hopelessness of ever quickening any love for him 
in her strange, wild heart. She may have read 
something of his thoughts, for she leaped lightly 
off the bough and stood, flushed, panting, but im- 
perious, by his side. 

“ There ! ” she said, “ enough of that. I am tired 
of swinging.” 

She looked around her with a sudden curiosity. 
At the point where they stood, on a crest of the 
rising ground, they could see over the Park wall in 
front of them the roofs and gables of a house. It 
was one of the many villas.of Kingston Vale, and 


THE HOLLOW PLACE. 


169 


it lay so deep in the little valley that their eyes 
were on a level with its highest towers, and could 
look down upon as much of the roof as was visible 
amidst the trees of its garden. 

“ How odd ! ” Candida said, seeming to speak 
rather to herself than with any idea of directly ad- 
dressing her companion. “I wonder if they could 
see us from that house ? ” 

“ I really don’t think any one Could see us,” he 
said, “ with so many trees between us. And even 
if they could, there does not seem to be a sign of 
any one about.” 

Candida did not seem to heed Swift’s reassur- 
ances. 

“ It certainly would be very funny,” she said, 
still more to herself than to Swift, “ if he ” 

“ What would be funny ? ” Swift inquired, now 
fairly mystified ; “ and who is ‘ he ’ ? ” 

“ Oh, nothing,” she said, “ only that I once knew 
— or, rather, my father once knew — a man that lived 
in that house. He was a soldier, a neighbor of 
ours in the country. I was only amused at think- 
ing how amazed he would be if he were to look out 
and see the little girl he knew jumping up and down 
in the branch of a tree with the assistance of a great 
Greek scholar ! ” 

Swift was a little surprised, but only a little. If 
now and then, as at this moment^ he was made 


lyo A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

aware of how little he knew of the past life of the 
girl who had become his so constant companion, 
the thought scarcely troubled him. Yet as she 
stood before him now, laughing and looking at the 
strange house that lay below them, he felt as he 
had felt before, that a chasm lay between their two 
lives which he had not the power to bridge. 

Candida noticed the shade of gravity that had 
stolen over Swift’s face, and she looked away from 
the house and stopped laughing, though she still 
smiled. 

“Come,” she said, “onward. We are lazy way- 
farers, you and I, and seize every pretext for a halt.” 

She turned, and began to climb higher up the 
slope, so quickly that Swift had to exert himself 
to keep by her side, while he admired the sylvan 
vigor of her movements, the elasticity of her splen- 
did youth. 

They were now on the summit of the rising 
ground, and the park stretched away before them 
— a green plain dotted with clumps of trees, and 
traversed by a white ribbon of road. 

“ It is good to look at, is it not ? ” said Swift. 
“ And all within such a little distance of squares 
and streets and slums. We could almost hear the 
roar of London. But if we pleased, we could gain 
a greater quiet in this quiet place. You see how 
flat the ground looks before us ? ” 


THE HOLLOW PLACE. l/l 

Candida nodded. 

“Well,-’ Swift went on, “ there is, almost at our 
feet as it were, a spot wherein fifty men might lie 
concealed, and no one who walked on yonder road 
be ever the wiser.” 

“Where ? ” Candida asked, looking all round her 
with surprise. “ I see no place where a cat could 
hide.” 

“ Come a little farther and you will,” Swift said. 
“ Do you see where those tufts of grass seem to 
grow a little thicker than the rest ? Well, just be- 
yond them there is a great hollow in the earth, so 
deep and wide that, as I said, I am sure fifty men 
could lie there unseen. I have lain there myself 
by the hour together, delighting in the sense that I 
was alone in the world, and that if an army was 
marching by on yonder highway I should be invisi- 
ble to them.” 

He walked forward for a few yards in silence, 
Candida keeping close by his side. Suddenly the 
green seemed to yawn, and in another moment they 
were standing on the edge of the chasm of which 
Swift had spoken. It was a sloping, irregular, sandy 
pit, partly overgrown with coarse grass and gorse 
bushes. As Swift had said, it would have easily 
sheltered half a hundred men from the observation 
of any one who did not come to its immediate edge. 

At the moment, however, when Candida and 


172 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Swift approached it, it only served to shelter one 
man. But it sheltered him so effectively that the 
pair had got to the very lip of the pit before they 
perceived that it had an occupant. His face was 
raised a very little above the level of the pit’s mouth, 
but it was concealed by the low bushes, through 
whose branches he seemed to be peering as if he 
were watching very intently something in the direc- 
tion of the wall. He was so intent upon his watch- 
ing, and Swift and Candida had come so quietly to 
the edge of the hole, that he had not heard their 
approach. 

Now, however. Swift, startled to find his lair in 
the possession of a stranger, gave an involuntary 
sound of surprise, which roused the man’s atten- 
tion. The sight seemed to cause him more surprise 
than his presence had caused to the new-comers, for 
he immediately fell on to his face again and lay so 
for a second or two quite still, as if he had been 
shot. Then suddenly he swung himself to his left 
side, so as to present his back to them, and, leaping 
to his feet, scrambled quickly up the further side 
of the pit and proceeded to run away across the 
grass as fast as his legs could carry him. 

Swift and Candida stared at each other for a mo- 
ment in amazement, and then, with one accord, they 
burst out laughing heartily. 

‘‘Well,” said Candida, pointing to the man, who 


The hollow place. 


173 


was still running as if for dear life among the trees, 
“ we seem to have startled one cave man a good 
deal. He was evidently in so great a hurry to depart 
that he did not notice that he had left some of his 
property behind him.” 

And Candida pointed to where, on the ground of 
the pit, lay a small piece of paper, folded square. 
Swift went down into the pit and picked it up. It 
was a curious yellowish color and of thin texture, so 
that Swift could see through the folds that it was cov- 
ered with some kind of black characters. Swift’s 
first idea was to signal to the man, but when he 
looked up for this purpose the man was out of 
sight. 

Where has he vanished to ? ” Swift asked of 
Candida, who had come down and was standing by 
his side. 

** The man ? ” Candida answered. “ He disap- 
peared behind those trees ” ; and she pointed to a 
clump of trees at the other side of the road. 

** What odd paper this is ! ” said Swift, showing 
it to his companion. “ And it seems to be full of 
writing.” 

“ Open it and see,” Candida suggested ; and, as 
Swift was really curious, he obeyed the suggestion 
and unfolded the paper. 

It was a large piece of paper when it was un- 
folded — of an oblong shape and a faded yellow 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


i;4 

tinge. It was covered with large characters that 
conveyed no meaning to Swift, and appeared to be 
printed by some common process, as in many places 
the ink was very pale. 

“ Well," said Swift, as he showed it to Candida, 
“ I am no wiser than before." 

“ Oh, I am so sorry," sighed Candida ; “ I felt 
sure that you would know, and 1 am dying of curi- 
osity." 

“ I think it is some Eastern script," Swift said. 
‘‘But I am^sorry to say that my limited education 
does not include Eastern tongues." 

• “ And is there no way of finding out ? " Candida 
asked. 

“ Oh yes," said Swift, “ I know a man who is a 
great linguist. He does a great deal of work for 
the Museum, and he lives quite near to me. I will 
take it to him for elucidation." 

“ And then you will tell me all about it." 

“ I will, indeed," Swift answered, and then he 
folded up the paper and put it carefully into his 
pocket-book. 


CHAPTER XVII. 


THE TURN OF HASSAN BRASS. 

Although I most devoutly disbelieve 
In necromancer’s nonsense, and the web 
Of glamor that your wizard tries to weave, 

There is a kind of softness at my heart 
For all the juggling fellowship. 

The Devil's Comedy » 

A S a matter of fact, however, Swift forgot all 
about the mysterious paper. He had laid 
it between the leaves of the book he was car- 
rying that day, which happened to be Shakespeare’s 
Sonnets^ and on the following day he chose another 
book for his companion, and the little volume of 
Shakespeare lay on his table unheeded. Swift for- 
got many things in those delightful days of dawn- 
ing summer that were of greater moment than a 
scrap of paper with strange signs upon it. He 
forgot, or he neglected, which came to the same 
thing, the claims of friendship, the claims of poli- 
tics, the claims of business. The Windovers might 
never have existed ; the Cordeliers might have 


175 


176 A woman' OF IMPULSE. 

been transplanted to Cloud-Cuckoo-Town, Cripple 
and Co. have been no better than a solar myth, for 
all the heed Swift paid to them. 

It was Candida, Candida, and always Candida. 
Since their expedition to Richmond Park their 
friendship seemed to have grown closer, stronger, 
dearer, more delightful than before. The fine 
weather persisted, and the example of their first 
adventure was persistently followed. The British 
Museum was abandoned, and the careless couple 
went wandering, day after day, in the green and 
gracious places which girdle London, as happy 
and as heedless as if they were indeed what they 
called themselves in jest — a pair of tramps. And 
as their bodies had broken away from the Mu- 
seum, their minds no longer occupied themselves 
with antiquity. The gods of Greece were suffered 
to sleep undisturbed on the summits of Olympus ; 
the man and the woman busied themselves, very 
youthfully, with problems. 

Swift was always in earnest ; Candida was al- 
ways curious. She told him one day that she had 
read The Cry for Liberty^ and she questioned him 
as to the various doctrines laid down in that re- 
markable volume with a closeness and a quickness 
that Swift at times found perplexing. The Cry did 
not seem so complete a body of social philosophy 
as Swift had hitherto believed it to be after some 


THE TURN OF HASSAN DRASS. 


177 


of these examinations. He had formulated certain 
theories, which he believed to be very broad theo- 
ries, of the relationships between man and woman. 
He had felt very sure at the time that these views 
were very sensible ; he was not quite so sure now 
when Candida, divinely smiling and divinely frank, 
interrogated him as to the permanent applicability 
of his ideas. But he stuck to his guns gallantly, 
defended himself and his opinions as well as he 
could, and fell deeper and deeper in love with his 
companion every day. 

And yet in all that time they talked no word of 
love. If Swift felt the sweet ache at his heart, out- 
wardly the alliance was only friendship. Candida 
had laid down her conditions, and Swift had ac- 
cepted them, and he meant to keep his promise. 
It was at times a kind of torture to him to be thus 
incessantly in the company of a woman he loved 
so well, and never to say word and never to look 
look that should betray his passion. But his honor 
was at stake, not merely in his promise to Candida, 
but in his adhesion to the great theory of The Cry 
for Liberty^ the theory of the possibility of friend- 
ship between a man and a woman as absolute as 
between a man and a man. So he thought of his 
love as of the genie in the Arabian tale, that it 
must be shut down in the compass of its little jar 

by virtue of the seal of Solomon. 

12 


1/8 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Candida, on her side, took the friendship with 
the sweet gravity, the smiling composure, which 
seemed to be her attitude towards life. Her hand 
when she gave it rested as calmly in Swift’s hand 
as if no thought of anything but friendship could 
ever come into their lives ; her eyes looked into 
his with an untroubled calm ; and the frankness 
of her speech, when she argued out the questions 
of The Cry for Liberty with its distinguished au- 
thor, made her serenity, made her indifference to 
what might be, the more convincing and the more 
tantalizing. She went about with Swift as tran- 
quilly as if she and he were doing the most ordi- 
nary thing in the world, as if young flesh never 
took fire, as if young blood never mutinied. 

She seemed so independent of and heedless of 
the ordinary rules that regulate the relations of 
free men with free women, that Swift, whose busi- 
ness it had been to defy conventionality in season 
and out of season, was once or twice startled to 
find himself suggesting to her, in a diffident, half- 
hearted way, that, perhaps, she did n’t know how 
unconventional their actions were. 

She silenced these suggestions by felicitous quo- 
tations from The Cry for Liberty^ and by assuring 
him that she was content for the present to be gov- 
erned by her own theories of right and wrong and 
by the admirable views of The Cry. So Swift had 


THE TURN OF HASSAN BRASS. 1 79 

nothing more to say, and the amazing friendship 
prospered. 

Since their essays in the sylvan life they were 
more together than ever. They almost always 
made their middle meal now like true gipsies, un- 
der a tree in some green woodland or in some 
tranquil reach of the river. And when they came 
back to town they would dine together very sim- 
ply, but very pleasantly, at a little Italian restaur- 
ant in a quiet street out of a very crowded street. 
Candida made no demur to dining daily with 
Swift ; the only thing she insisted upon was that 
if he paid for the dinner one day she should pay 
for it on the next. If he agreed to that she would 
dine with him as often as he liked. If -he did not 
agree to it she would not dine with him at all. So 
Swift could not choose but consent, and so it came 
about that they dined together daily, very joyously 
and very modestly, on the principle of alternate 
host, in the quiet, kindly little restaurant, whose 
people at last got to know them and to expect their 
coming and salute them cheerily. After these din- 
ners Swift would escort Candida home to Bury 
Street, and at Bury Street he always parted from 
her. She never asked him to come in, and he 
never asked to be allowed to come in. They al- 
ways shook hands in the doorway, and Swift always 
waited till the last sound of Candida’s ascending 


A woman of impulse. 


180 

footsteps had died away, and then he went on tO 
Queen Square to read himself sleepy over Plato, 
and so to dream of Candida and the next day’s 

Joy* 

One day towards the end of May, on a return 
from one of their expeditions. Swift’s attention 
was arrested by an advertisement in the railway- 
station. It was one of the many large colored 
posters with which the Imperial Theatre of Varie- 
ties adorned the walls of London, posters which 
presented a number of pictorial representations of 
performers of all kinds, from dancing girls to 
dancing elephants. The particular picture which 
caught Swift’s eye represented a man in Eastern 
costume encircled by gigantic snakes, and the 
legend announced the unparalleled performances 
of Hassan Drass, the great Indian snake-charmer. 
This could be no other than his mysterious host, 
and Swift immediately resolved that he would go 
and see him. A study of the column in an evening 
newspaper devoted to the music-halls informed 
him that Mr. Brass’ turn came late in the evening’s 
entertainment. So after Candida and he had dined 
together, and after he had seen her home to Bury 
Street, instead of going on to his own rooms in 
Queen Square, he turned back towards town and 
steered for the Imperial Theatre of Varieties. 

But the Imperial Theatre was popular, the even- 


THE TURN OF HASSAN DRASS. l8l 

ing was half over ; there was not a seat left. So 
Swift, on the suggestion of the man in the box- 
oflice, took a ticket for the promenade, which 
allowed him to walk all round the stalls and to 
stand where he pleased in the space allotted for 
promenaders. 

He took up his position by a pillar quite near 
to the stage, and waited. He had bought a 
programme as he came in, and the programme in- 
formed him that the turn of the snake-charmer was 
number sixteen. The number now displayed at 
the sides was fourteen, and was, as he learned from 
his programme, the number of the turn of the Sis- 
ters Aaron. The Sisters Aaron were four young 
ladies of a showily handsome, obviously Jewish 
favor, who were singing in chorus a song that 
informed the listeners that they were “ the models, 
yes, the models of the English aristocracy.” Swift 
did not approve of the English aristocracy, but he 
did not think that such specimens of its women- 
kind as he had seen at all resembled the Sisters 
Aaron, who, however asserted their theory with 
much noise and persistence. They did not amuse 
Swift, and his glance wandered over the full house 
with the interest he always felt in crowds. 

It was not at all the habitual music-hall audi- 
ence. The Imperial Theatre of Varieties affected 
grandeur ; most of the visitors to the more expen- 


i 82 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


sive places came in evening dress ; there were a 
quantity of women' in the boxes, and even in the 
stalls, who looked obviously smart. Some of the 
people Swift knew by sight. Lord Lancelot was 
in the stage-box with a number of handsome 
women ; in the stalls he recognized one of the# 
younger members of the Government, who seemed 
to be entertaining a party of friends. Close to 
him in a corner stall sat some one he knew per- 
sonally, Theocritus Marlowe, the writer of rhymes. 
He was not surprised to find Marlowe there. 

He knew that Marlowe, tired of being over- 
shadowed by Jack Harris in the propagation of 
the Higher Culture, had constituted himself the 
Apostle of the Music-Hall, the preacher, -in melo- 
dious verse, of the New Gospel of the' Variety 
Show. Marlowe, who was listening with apr'ihtent 
air of rapture to the utterances of the^Sisters 
Aaron, sighed a faint sigh, half of pleasure, half of 
regret, as that remarkable turn came to an end. 
Then, as he glanced away from the stage, he saw 
Swift standing by the pillar, and immediately got 
up and came over to talk to him. Swift had a kind 
of interest for Theocritus Marlowe. A man who 
could do without so many of the things which 
seemed to him to be essential to the acceptance of 
life was a curious problem, a host as worthy of at- 
tention as a contortionist, a performing dog, or a 


THE TURN OF HASSAN BRASS. 1 83 


Mammoth Comique. Also Theocritus felt that it 
would look rather nice for him to be seen in the 
carefully harmonized black and white of his even- 
ing dress, standing in speech with a big man in a 
cheap yellow suit. So he saluted Swift with that 
air of languor which, in his mind, lent a piquancy 
to his chosen part as patron of the music-hall, and 
Swift accepted his salutation with composure. 

“ What have you come here for. Swift ? ” he 
asked. “ Does this sort of thing ” — and he waved 
his hand vaguely in the direction of the stage, 
where an energetic gentleman was doing an imi- 
tation of a brass band — “ does this sort of thing 
come within the range of practical politics, or are 
you an emissary of the County Council come to 
mark us down for judgment ?” 

“ For none of these reasons,” Swift answered 
composedly. “ I have come to see the man with 
the snakes.” 

“ Oh yes, the Serpent King,” Marlowe said. 
“He is quite interesting — quite nice. You come 
in the nick, too ; this is just his turn.” 

For already the gentleman who simulated the 
brass band had, as it were, blown himself off the 
stage, and the attendants were slipping the number 
sixteen into the spaces. The great curtains of yel- 
low brocade had fallen, aijd remained down for 
some appreciable seconds, during which Marlowe 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


184 

amicably pointed out to Swift various celebrities 
who were present in the house. Then the curtains 
were drawn aside for the entertainment of the Ser- 
pent King. Swift’s curiosity was satisfied. The 
Serpent King was certainly his host of Camden 
Town. 

The man began his performance. He opened 
some great coffers that stood behind him, and he 
drew out from them great coils of monstrous shin- 
ing snakes that he laid about him on the floor within 
the enclosure. Swift could not avoid giving a kind 
of shudder as he thought of the circumstances un- 
der which he had first seen those terrible beasts who 
now crawled and wriggled round and round their 
master as if something in his very presence invinci- 
bly attracted them. When the enclosure was alive 
with snakes the man began to play with them, wind-, 
ing the hugest of the beasts round his body, twisting 
smaller ones round his arms, till it was hardly possi- 
ble to see anything of his body for the mass of ser- 
pents that encircled him. Their weight alone must 
have been enormous, but he seemed to support it 
with ease. If those awful coils had tightened a 
little more they would inevitably have squeezed out 
the man’s life, but the creatures seemed to be en- 
tirely under his domination, and to obey his slight- 
est word or wish. At some sign from him they all 
uncurled themselves and left him free ; then he 


THE TURN OF HASSAN BRASS. 


I85 


began to play to them on a little pipe that he plucked 
from his girdle, and all the snakes, big and little, 
began to move about the enclosure rhythmically to 
the fantastic music that came with the piper’s 
breath. There was something curiously attractive 
in seeing the man standing there blowing plaintive, 
alluring sounds from his reed, and the striped and 
spotted beasts swaying to the music and gliding 
about in a kind of ecstasy of fascination. After 
he had played for a few minutes, he stopped and 
began to put the reptiles back again into their boxes. 
The turn was only a brief one — but it fascinated 
while it lasted, and the audience was prodigal of 
applause. 

“ I wonder,” Swift said, “ if there is any way by 
which I could get a word with that man. Do you 
know the way to the stage-door ? ” 

“ Do I know the way to the stage-door ? ” Theoc- 
ritus answered with an amused smile. “ Of course 
I do ; but by the time you got there the fellow might 
be gone, and waiting at a stage-door is a slow busi- 
ness, any way. If you want to see him at once, I 
can manage it for you.” 

Marlowe led him down to a door at the end of 
the promenade, a door which was marked “ Private.” 
Marlowe opened the private door, which led di- 
rectly to the stage. 

“ I am one of the directors,” Marlowe said to 


1 86 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

Swift, “ so I can come and go as I please. Ah, 
there is our Indian friend looking after his precious 
worms. Come along.” 

Swift, as he hurriedly followed Marlowe’s lead, 
noted quickly and curiously the details of the en- 
vironment : the great gaunt stage, of which only a 
little piece seemed necessary for the purposes of 
representation ; the performers who waited dressed 
and ready for their turn ; the men in evening-dress, 
friends of the management or of the stars, who 
talked to the performers and each other ; the little 
group that clustered at the sides to watch for the 
fiftieth time a popular turn ; the bewildering lights 
and shades ; the trained activity of the stage hands ; 
the rapid movements of the dressing-women ; the 
muffled forms of the girls who were to go in the 
series of living pictures, and who sheltered their 
slightly-clad bodies from the draughts in garments 
that looked like loose bathing-wrappers. 

Any new sights interested Swift, but he had not 
time for more than the rapidest impression. Mar- 
lowe was already at the farthest corner of the back 
of the stage where the Indian was superintending 
the removal of his two boxes of snakes. Marlowe 
touched him on the arm, and said, as he turned 
round : “ Mr. Brass, here is a friend of mine who 
wants to congratulate you on your performance.” 

“Your friend and I are friends already,” the In- 


THE TURN OF HASSAN DRASS. 1 8/ 

dian said in his s4ow soft voice. “ I hope you are 
well, Mr. Swift.” 

“ I am delighted to see you again,” Swift said. 
“ I thought that you had vanished for ever.” 

“You are very good,” Mr. Brass answered, “to 
take an interest in the stranger from across the great 
water. But I knew very well that we should meet 
again and again, and my heart is not big with joy 
at the knowledge,” 

There was certainly no sound of satisfaction in 
Mr. Brass’ smooth monotonous voice ; there was 
certainly no sign of satisfaction in Mr. Brass’ shin- 
ing snake-like eyes. It was perfectly plain that he 
was not at all glad to see Swift, and Swift, wonder- 
ing why, acted, as he usually acted, upon impulse, 
and asked for a reason. 

“ How did you know that we should meet again ? ” 
Swift said. “ And why should it matter to you one 
way or another ? ” 

They were standing alone at the moment in that 
farther corner of the stage, Marlowe had turned 
aside to talk to the manager, an elderly gentleman 
who looked like a Cabinet Minister. There was 
some kind of little play being played now, and the 
stage behind the scene was quiet and almost de- 
serted. 

The snake-charmer slipped his hand for a mo- 
ment inside his silken vest, and drew it out again 


i88 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


closed closely over some small object. He stretched 
out his clenched fist towards Swift, and slowly 
opened it. Swift saw that a small crystal ball lay 
on the Indian’s extended palm. 

“ I see you there,” Mr. Brass said, “ I see you 
there dimly, and I know that your presence is not 
propitious to me. I cannot read very clearly in 
the crystal since I came to this strange land and 
these cold skies. But I know that the way I see 
you is a warning, though I know not of what dan- 
ger, and I am willing to be warned.” 

Swift felt a disposition to smile, but the speaker’s 
face was perfectly grave, and his manner was not 
the manner of the charlatan, so Swift restrained 
his inclination. He said quietly : 

“ I do not see why the wizard’s crystal should 
warn you against me. I do not see how I can cross 
your path. I am not a member of your profession. 
I am not a rival snake-charmer.” 

“ That is quite true,” said Mr. Brass. He spoke 
as calmly as if he were talking over the most ordi- 
nary matter, instead of treating of thoughts beyond 
the reaches of the soul. “ That is quite true. There 
is no reason why you should be called upon to 
interfere with my ” — he paused for a moment as if 
to find the suitable word, and then went on — “ with 
my business in Europe.” 

Not the slightest,” Swift answered, smiling. 


THE TURN OF HASSAN DRASS. 1 89 

“ On the contrary, I should be glad to assist you 
in any way in my power, in return for your kind- 
ness to me.” 

The Indian looked at the sphere again, and 
shook his head as he slipped it back again into his 
vest. 

“ I do not think you can help me,” he said, ‘‘ but 
I trust that you will not hinder me. I cannot see 
clearly in the sphere ; there is a mist. You are 
lucky ; you are very lucky.” 

“ It is very good of you to say so,” said Swift, 
who began to find the situation a little absurd. 
‘‘ But I ought to tell you that I do not believe in 
the least in this sort of thing.” 

The snake-charmer let go Swift’s hands, and drew 
himself up gravely. 

“ In this instance,” he said quietly, “ what you 
believe or do not believe is of no moment. It is 
what I believe that is of importance to me, and I 
believe that your luck is opposed to mine.” 

“ I ’m sure I hope not,” Swift said cordially ; 
“ and I am sure that I should be sorry in any way 
to offend against your beliefs. There may be more 
things between heaven and earth ” 

“ ‘ Than are dreamt of in your philosophy,’ ” Mr. 
Brass went on quietly, completing the quotation. 
Then, seeing the look of surprise on Swift’s face, 
h^ added : 


igO A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

“ Does it surprise you that the poor snake- 
charmer should know Hamlet ? But I learned 
English at the college at Madras, and I got a prize 
for English literature. I owe much to the English 
Raj.” 

“You certainly speak English very well,” Swift 
said. He thought that Mr. Drass was a very cu- 
rious person, with his snakes and his sorceries, and 
his prize for English literature. 

“ It is good for the slave that he speak the tongue 
of his master,” the Indian said softly to himself. 
Then, in a louder tone, he added : “ It would be 
bad for me in my business if I did not speak Eng- 
lish. And now, with your permission, I will wish 
you good-night.‘’ 

He turned away and disappeared just as Marlowe, 
who had finished his conversation with the manager, 
came up and joined Swift. 

“ Well,” said Marlowe, “ how did you like your 
Indian Johnny ? ” 

“ He is very curious,” Swift said, more to him- 
self than to his companion. 

Swift had no desire to see any more of the show, 
so Marlowe conducted him to the stage-door. Un- 
der its flaring gas-lamp they parted, Marlowe re- 
turning to meditate upon a new poem for his coming 
volume. Variety Verses, and Swift speeding to Queen 
Square with his mind as usual occupied with Can- 


THE TURN OF HASSAN BRASS. I9I 

dida and his heart rejoicing with the thought of 
seeing her next day. 

Swift found little to envy in the life of Theoc- 
ritus Marlowe, but he did feel inclined to envy 
him that facility in the framing of verses which 
enabled him to make his homages wear pretty 
shapes like well-placed posies of flowers. He 
would have liked to write rhymes to Candida, but 
the game was not for him, and so he contented 
himself in that spring night by repeating to him- 
self all the fairest lines he could remember from a 
book that contained such a wonder of sweet words. 
The Sonnets of Shakespeare. His talk with Mr. 
Brass had brought Shakespeare into his mind, and 
so had led to the Sonnets and their application to 
love. There was a line he could not remember, 
do what he would ; so when he got home and lit 
his gas, he looked for the little volume of the Son- 
nets where it had lain unheeded on his table for 
many days. 

As he took it up, a bit of paper fell from between 
its pages. Swift picked it up, and saw that it was 
the curious fragment which he had found in Rich- 
mond Park, and had promised to get deciphered 
and had forgotten all about. He made a resolve 
to see about it on the morrow, and on that resolve 
he went to bed and to sleep and to dreams of Can- 
dida. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


LONELY. 

Ask of the wind as it wails in the heather, 

Ask of the sea-bird that strains to the sea, 

Ask of the roses that cluster together. 

Where my Aminta is hiding from me. 

A Pastoral in Pink. 

H e awoke, as he always awoke now, with the 
thought of her in his mind, and the hope to 
see her in his heart. But when he went into 
his workroom he found some letters on his table, 
and one of them, as he saw at once, to his great sur- 
prise, was from Candida. He knew her hand-writ- 
ing, though she had never written to him before, 
and the letter was sealed with a seal that he had 
given to her — a Greek gem that represented a head 
of Pallas. He opened it with an apprehension that 
its contents justified. 

“ My Dear Friend : ” Candida wrote. 

“ I shall not be able to see you for a little while. 
It will, I hope and believe, only be a short while, 
and, indeed, it grieves me much that there should 
192 


LONELY. 


193 


be even this break in our comradeship. You will 
hear from me again as soon as it is possible for us to 
meet. I shall be as glad of the meeting as you 
for I hold our friendship dear, and shall miss your 
companionship. But you will remember that you 
consented to take me on my own imperious terms, 
and you must accept my disappearance as unques- 
tioningly as you accepted the other conditions 
which made our alliance so delightful. I will not 
ask you not to miss me, for I am vain enough to 
think that you will miss me, but at least you will 
not have to miss me for long. Believe in me and 
trust me as I believe in you and trust you.” Then, 
with no further formalities, came her bold signature, 

“ Candida.” 

Swift put the letter down with a groan. In a 
moment all the merry world was withered into sad- 
ness, the sunny day seemed as gray as winter. 
What did it all mean ? Why was she going away ? 
Where was she going to ? Why had she told him 
so suddenly — taking him at all adventure ? It was 
true that her letter spoke only of a brief absence, 
but did she really mean that — could he count upon 
that ? How little, after all, he knew of her ! He 
had met her by chance, and now chance seemed to 
carry her away, and all that he knew was the name 

of a girl who lived by herself and liked to read 
13 


194 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


books and to walk walks, and who was very beauti- 
ful and whom he loved. But what she had been 
in the days before he met her, how she had lived 
her life, whom she had known, liked, disliked, per- 
haps loved — all this was as much of a mystery to 
him as her sudden and fantastic disappearance. 

Swift sat for a while silently, stupidly, like a man 
nearly stunned. He felt too wretched to hope, too 
wretched to think, too wretched to be conscious of 
anything except a sense of despair. He stared with 
weary eyes at her portrait, and murmured her name 
again and again. Candida, Candida, Candida ! 
To think that he might never see her again, and 
that he had never told her that he loved her ! 
Why had he not told her, he asked himself angrily, 
and then his conscience answered the question, re- 
minding him of his promise, and appealing to his 
honor. He took up her letter again and read the 
words in which she assured him that she believed 
in him and trusted him. He made a gallant effort 
to regain his self-possession. 

There were two other letters on his table. The 
first was from the secretary of the Cordeliers’ Club, 
calling his attention to the fact that he had not at- 
tended a single meeting of the committee for some 
time past, and pointing out that this was an in- 
fringement of one of the principal rules of the as- 
sociation. It added that another meeting was to 


LONELY. 


195 


be held on the following day, at which his presence 
was requested to consider a matter of much impor- 
tance. The second was a hurried scrawl in Bud- 
get’s large, loose hand, saying that he wanted to 
see Swift as soon as possible on urgent business, 
but not saying what the urgent business was. 

“Well,” Swift said to himself with a dreary 
effort to be courageous, “ the world goes on, what- 
ever happens, and if love flies out of the window 
business walks in at the door. Courage, man, 
courage ! Don’t play the fool ! Pull yourself to- 
gether, and remember that work is the purpose of 
a man’s life.” 

Somewhat cheered by these edifying reflections, 
although he felt that they sounded a little hollow 
and unreal. Swift set himself steadily to make the 
best of the loneliness that had been forced upon 
him. He worked away doggedly for some time, 
trying hard to forget the name that was sighing 
in his ears, trying hard to ignore the ache at his 
heart. But at last he gave it up as a bad job, 
and went out into the open air, with the vol- 
ume of Shakespeare’s Sonnets in his pockets, and 
the mysterious paper inside the volume. Here 
was a momentary way of killing time which might 
possibly have some gleam of interest in it. The 
new Homeric commentators had none. Not, at 
least, that morning. 


CHAPTER XIX. 


MR. HEMPLETT. 

Here is one 

That can decipher any kind of speech — 

Runes, hieroglyphics, Oghams, cuneiforms, 

The symbols of the Aztecs, what you will ; 

One that can talk a hundred different tongues, 

And read in every language in the world 
Not worth the reading. Oh, a marvellous man, 

A proper pedant ! 

The Wish of the World. 

O N the side of an open doorway in Great Rus- 
sell Street were several small bell-handles, 
and by the side of each bell-handle was 
a strip of brass presenting the name of the person 
to whom the bell belonged. The strip of brass 
that accompanied the third bell bore the inscrip- 
tion “ S. Hemplett.” It was S. Hemplett that 
Swift had come to see. 

Mr. Septidecimus Hemplett was a learned lin- 
guist who came of a learned stock. It had pleased 
a Hemplett in the latter years of the last century 
to christen his children, of whom he had three, by 
the Roman numerals. His first boy was Primus 
196 


MR. HEMPLETT. 


197 


Hemplett, his first girl was Prima Hemplett. The 
excellent grammarian had thought at first of call- 
ing her Secunda, but he decided, upon mature re- 
flection, that it would be better to allow the sexes 
to have independent lines. His third child, a boy, 
became, duly, Secundus Hemplett. The peda- 
gogic humor established a hereditary custom in 
the Hemplett family. Thus it came to pass that 
Mr. Hemplett found himself favored with the son- 
orous name of Septidecimus. As He was unmar- 
ried, and did not seem to be at all a marrying man, 
there was every likelihood that the arithmetical 
jest would come to an end with him. 

Swift went slowly up the three flights of stairs, 
and knocked at the door on the third landing. 
After a moment he heard the sound of shuffling 
feet ; then the drawing of a latch. The door 
opened, and Mr. Septidecimus Hemplett stood in 
the doorway peering at his visitor. 

Mr. Septidecimus Hemplett was a tall, thin man, 
of a somewhat stork-like build, and with a long, 
beak-shaped nose that heightened his resemblance 
to the bird of the North. His dome-like head was 
largely bald, and long wisps of a dust-colored hair 
were brushed up around it to form a thin veil for 
its bareness. His skin was dry and parchment- 
colored ; his chin was as peaked as his nose ; he 
was smooth-shaven, and he wore spectacles over 


198 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


his pale blue eyes. His lean, angular body was 
clothed in a suit of a pale-gray stuff, which looked 
dusty as he looked dusty. Books were bulging 
out of the pockets of his coat ; he had a book un- 
der his arms, and another in his hand. 

“ My dear Mr. Swift,” he said, “ is it you ? I 
am delighted to see you. Pray walk in.” 

Swift accepted the invitation, and preceded the 
scholar into his familiar study. 

There never was such a room for books. The 
place overflowed with them. And all these books 
were books upon languages. There were gram- 
mars, dictionaries, vocabularies, studies, histories 
of every language spoken by man upon the face 
of the earth, of every language that has ever 
been spoken by man since he first framed his 
crude ideas in almost formless sound. Here 
were treatises on Egyptian hieroglyphics cheek by 
jowl with pamphlets upon the Chinook jargon ; 
speculations upon early Etruscan lay side by side 
with volumes upon Pigeon English and the tongue 
of the gipsies. A volume on French theatrical 
slang rested in whimsical companionship with a 
dictionary of the speech of the Sioux Red In- 
dians. 

“ Will you excuse me for one moment ? ” Mr. 
Hemplett said apologetically. “ I just want to 
finish this page of notes on some -resemblances 


MR. HEMPLETT. 


199 


that I am tracing between the Icelandic of the 
days of Eric the Red and the remains of the abo- 
riginal languages of the New England tribes. I 
have a line of argument to conclude, and it is of 
great importance.” 

Swift nodded assent, and Mr. Hemplett plunged 
his face into the papers on his table, while Swift 
allowed his gaze to wander among the books on the 
groaning shelves all around him. 

It seemed to the poet in Swift to be a somewhat 
arid library, and a somewhat arid life that it over- 
shadowed. Among all those masses of volumes, 
if his glance occasionally discovered the book of 
some poet, the book of some writer of living prose, 
he knew very well that it was not there for its own 
sake, but solely because of the assistance it might 
render to the settlement of some linguistic prob- 
lem. Homer only interested Mr. Hemplett because 
he composed in Ionic Greek, and he only read 
the Pentamerone because it was composed in Nea- 
politan. 

Presently Mr. Hemplett raised his head, pushed 
his papers from him, closed a big book with a sigh 
of satisfaction, and turned his spectacles upon 
Swift. 

“Well,” he said, “what can I do for you, my 
young friend ? ” 

Swift took the paper out of his pocket. “ I 


200 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


wanted to ask you,” he said, “if you would be 
kind enough to tell me what is written on this 
paper ? ” 

Mr. Hemplett took the paper, unfolded it, and 
glanced at it through his carefully adjusted spec- 
tacles. 

“ Ah ! ” said Mr. Hemplett, “ this is curious, 
this is interesting — very curious and interesting in- 
deed.” 

“ What is it ? ” said Swift, languidly ; but for an- 
other few seconds Mr. Hemplett read on without 
answering him. Then the linguist again lifted his 
spectacled face and looked at Swift. 

“ This paper,” he said, “ is written in Hindustani. 
It is, or purports to be, a copy of an appeal for 
vengeance made by an Indian soldier who was exe- 
cuted for murder during the Mutiny.” 

“An appeal for vengeance!” Swift echoed in 
surprise. 

“Yes,” said Mr. Hemplett ; “ it is, as it were, a 
kind of voice from the grave calling for revenge. 
This is what it says.” 

And Hemplett began to read in his slow, monoto- 
nous voice the words of the paper, words that ap- 
peared all the grimmer from the quiet, colorless way 
in which the reader read them. 

“ This is the imprecation cried out to Heaven by 
Ram Hassan Ali, Duffadar of the Second Regi- 


MR. HEMPLETT. 


201 


merit of Light Cavalry, who was executed at the 
slaughter-house in Cawnpore on July 24, 1857, for 
the killing of infidel women and children. 

“ O Mahommed, only Prophet of the only God, 
the merciful, the compassionate, vouchsafe in thy 
clemency and thy pity to receive into Paradise the 
soul of thy slave whose tongue has been defiled by 
licking of infidel blood from the floor of the slaugh- 
ter-house, whose body, defiled by the blows of the 
infidel, is shortly to be blown from a gun. O Ma- 
hommed, only Prophet of the only God, in the days 
yet to be, inspire my son, Rassan Ali, who is now an 
infant at Meerut, with the spirit of vengeance that 
he may revenge his father’s death upon his mur- 
derer, and the children of his murderer, until blood 
has atoned for blood. And I, now at the door of 
death, bequeath my blessing to my son if he obey my 
prayer, and my curse here and hereafter if he dis- 
obey me. And the name of my murderer is the 
name of the commander of my regiment. 

“ I certainly don’t understand it,” said Swift. 
“ It seems to me a very incoherent document.” 

“ No,” said Mr. Hemplett ; “ I don’t think it is 
that. I understand it very well, but then ” — he 
added this apologetically, as if to avoid hurting 
Swift’s feelings — “ you see, I am familiar with East- 
ern documents. I see the whole thing plainly 
enough. This man, who was about to be executed, 


202 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


no doubt called out this message to the crowd. It 
was, no doubt, written down by some pious fakir 
who would conceive it to be his duty to carry it to 
the son. It was probably printed and distributed 
through all the bazaars. It may have reached the 
son, or it may not.” 

“ I wonder,” said Swift, “how one could find out 
what was the name of the officer in command at 
the time, to whom the denunciation refers.” 

“ That ought not to be difficult,” said Mr. Hemp- 
lett. “You would find the name, no doubt, in any 
history of the Mutiny, if the man happened to be 
prominent, or, in any case, you could find it out in 
the volume of the Army List for that year. You 
will find a set, of course, in the British Museum.” 

“ Of course I shall,” said Swift. “ Thank you 
very much for your kindness. I will go over to the 
Reading-room at once.” 

“ There is very little to thank me for,” said Mr. 
Hemplett. “Hindustani is a very easy tongue. 
It is I who have to thank you for a pleasant inter- 
lude in my work. You have not been to see me for 
a long time. I was beginning to wonder what had 
become of you.” 

Swift felt that he was blushing under the kindly 
gaze of Mr. Hemplett’s spectacles. It was quite 
true that he had not been near the old scholar, that 
he had not been near any of his old friends, for 


MR. HEMPLETT. 


203 


quite a long time. The companionship of Candida 
had made him indifferent to and forgetful of all 
other companionship. Now he felt that the blush 
on his cheeks deepened while he stammered out 
something about having been exceedingly busy, 
while all the while his guilty conscience reminded 
him of the shut books, the dusty papers, the neg- 
lected task on his table at home. 

Perhaps Mr. Hemplett’s studies had not alto- 
gether dried the sap of humanity in his withered 
body. Perhaps he noted the flush on Swift’s face, 
and perhaps he understood it aright. For he smiled 
a little as he said : 

“ Well, well ! young men must be busy as well as 
old ones.” Then he added somewhat irrelevantly, 
“ I was young myself once.” 

Swift suddenly began to wonder, if in later days 
he should find as much content in the companion- 
ship of books as Mr. Hemplett seemed to find. As 
far as he had permitted himself to plan out a future, 
he had always pictured himself as working at his 
favorite work, acquiring a little more knowledge, a 
little more credit for his knowledge, a little more 
reward for his knowledge, and growing wiser in 
growing older, content with his lot. But now a 
woman’s face had shone upon his life, and by that 
light he seemed to read its meaning quite differ- 
ently, and to be stirred by all manner of hopes and 


204 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


fears, agitations and desires, which had left him un- 
vexed before. 

He had always liked Mr. Hemplett, but he now 
felt a sudden sense of affection for the old scholar, 
an affection inspired partly and principally by the 
contrast between the romantic colors in which his 
own life was now painted and the neutral gray of 
Mr. Hemplett’s bookish existence. So it was with 
a kind of tenderness that he took the linguist’s 
hand, and it seemed to him that it was with a kind 
of tenderness that Mr. Hemplett returned the grasp. 
Then Mr. Hemplett dropped back into his books 
again, and Swift went slowly down the stairs, trying 
to keep his mind interested in the contents of the 
piece of paper, and resolved at once to visit the 
British Museum. 


CHAPTER XX. 


THE COMING MAN. 

It is a great art to make the mind up wisely and well. It 
is even something, at a pinch, to make it up unwisely and ill. 
At least the mind is made up. Some people never make up 
their minds at all all through life, but seem to pause, perpetu- 
ally irresolute, on the brink of possibility. 

The Letters of Pertinax. 

B ut it was fated that Swift was not to consult 
the Army List that day. For at the top of 
the steps, just as he was going in, he ran 
against Windover, who was just coming out. 
Windover caught Swift eagerly by the arm. 

“ I am so glad to have met you. I thought there 
might be a chance of finding you in the Museum, 
where I had to go to look up some facts for a paper 

that I wanted to finish before Well, I will tell 

you before what if you can spare the time to walk 
part of the way with me.” 

Swift was really glad to see Windover, and the 
Army List could keep. He saw by his friend’s 
manner that there was something which he wished 
to talk about, and even if Swift’s errand to the 
205 


2o6 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Museum had been more important than it was, he 
would have given it the go-by to salve in some 
degree his own conscience, sore at his neglect of 
the Windovers. So he walked by Windover’s side 
down the steps and across the courtyard back into 
Great Russell Street. 

The first few seconds of their conversation Win- 
dover devoted to playfully upbraiding Swift for 
having left him and Lucilla in the cold for so long. 

“ What has become of you ? Where have you 
been ? ” he asked. “ I began to fear that you had 
emigrated or married, or perhaps both. Now I 
perceive that you have not emigrated. Is it by 
chance the other trifle, actually or potentially ? ” 

Swift felt his cheeks grow hotter, but he laughed 
an assertive denial. 

“ Then, what have you been doing to treat us so 
shamefully ? ” Windover persevered. 

Swift murmured a stumbling explanation about 
being very busy, then reminded Windover, by way 
of turning the conversation, that there was some- 
thing he promised to tell him. 

“ It ’s rather curious,’^ Windover said, “ and I 
know you will be surprised ; but the fact is that I 
have definitely decided to go into Parliament — at 
least I am going to try,” he added, as a deferential 
protest to the fates against Rockielaw’s certainty. 

Swift stared at him in considerable surprise. He 


THE COMING MAN. 


207 


had forgotten all about the offer that had been 
made to Windover. It was curious to think of him 
as coming forward, with his cool air of agreeable 
scholarship, into the heat and the dust of political 
life. That Windover should direct the course of 
Ministers in a column of prose as elegant as Bol- 
ingbroke’s, that he should reprimand revolution 
with austere grace in learned periodicals, was fit- 
ting, was natural, was even inevitable. But that he 
should leave his desk and his books and his green 
garden and his pretty wife, to fling himself into 
the scrimmage, seemed to Swift scarcely less as- 
tounding than it would be to see him suddenly 
pluck off his high hat and his neatly-built frock- 
coat and jerk himself joyously into a row at a 
street corner. He looked carefully at his com- 
panion’s face, to see if he could read there any 
lurking humor, any half-hidden hint that Win- 
dover was pleased to be merry. But he saw no 
such signs there, and Windover, who seemed to 
guess what he was looking for, burst out laughing. 

“You are surprised,” he said — “very much sur- 
prised. Confess it. I knew you would be ; so did 
Lucilla.” 

“Well,” said Swift, slowly, “I certainly am sur- 
prised. It seems a little sudden, coming on one in 
this unexpected way.” 

“ It would not have come upon you in this unex- 


208 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


pected way,” Windover retorted, “ if your friends 
had been fortunate enough to see anything of you 
for the last six weeks. At least, I could have told 
you that I was gradually making up my mind to 
accept, if the business ever took a definite shape. 
The business has now taken a definite shape. The 
other fellow has formally applied for the Chiltern 
Hundreds.” 

“ Well,” said Swift, “ I am sure I hope you will 
like it ! ” Windover’s quick ear caught the dubi- 
ousness in the wish. 

“ Oh, of course it ’s a toss-up ! ” he admitted. 
“ I don’t wish to pose as a Noble Roman, and that 
sort of thing ; but, to be honest with you, I should 
not dream of coming forward if it had not been 
made very plain to me that it was in a great degree 
my duty to do so.” 

“ I am sure of that,” Swift assented. 

“Of course, I know very well,” Windover went 
on, “that my view of things is not your view of 
things. You are a Rad, and a Red, and all the 
rest of it, and you call me a reactionary, and I am 
quite content to accept the title. But if I do get 
into that blessed peace, you may be sure that I shall 
try and do my best for the country, and not merely 
what is best for my party.” 

There was a moment’s silence between the two 
men, as they walked slowly along Gower Street. 


THE COMING MAN. 


209 


For a moment it came into Windover’s mind to tell 
Swift of Budget’s extraordinary overture to Rockie- 
law. But he immediately put the idea aside. Bud- 
get was a friend of Swift’s as well as of his own, 
and, after all, it was no part of one friend’s duty 
to speak of another friend’s disloyalty to a third. 
It would be ungenerous to tell tales, Windover re- 
flected. After all. Budget may not have appreci- 
ated the indecency of his action, and even if he 
did, nothing would be gained by betraying his con- 
duct to Swift. So Windover held his peace on the 
subject ; it did not occur to him as possible that 
anything in Swift’s life could depend at all upon 
whether he spoke out or kept silence about Budget 
that afternoon. 

Swift broke the brief silence with a question. 

“ When do you begin ? ” Swift asked. He was 
so much interested at the idea of Windover’s elec- 
tion that he almost forgot for the moment how 
miserable he was. 

“ I am going down almost immediately,” Win- 
dover answered ; “ I and Lucilla — Lucilla goes, of 
course. Rockielaw says that Lucilla would make 
a splendid canvasser. We are all going to stop 
with Sir Charles Amber at The Towers. The Am- 
bers have been Miss Carteret’s closest friends since 
her mother died. They are, I believe, delightful 

people.” 

14 


210 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Do you know,” said Swift, “ I have it in my 
heart to wish that I could turn Conservative for a 
fortnight, that I might go down to Bullfo^d with 
you, and help you to carry Pine Hill. I should 
love to see Lucilla canvassing, and to hear you 
thunder from political platforms. It is a mail’s life 
after all.” 

“Yes,” Windover said, “it is a man’s life, of a 
sort. A real man ought to be a soldier or a sailor, 
or an explorer or a gipsy, to be an active, mobile, 
adventurous creature, not a sluggard who stoops 
over a desk or squats behind a counter. But if a 
poor devil of a man of letters can be none of these 
things, he may find a kind of substitute in the po- 
litical hurly-burly, and give and take some lusty 
strokes, and learn the joy of eventful living, and, 
who knows ? prove in the end not wholly unservice- 
able to his mother, the country. Yes, yes, let us 
assure ourselves that it is a man’s life after all.” 

Swift sighed wearily, and Windover, noting the 
sigh, mistook it. 

“ Come,” he said, “ you live a man’s life in your 
way, with your Cry for Liberty and your Cordeliers, 
and all the rest of it.” 

To which Swift, disagreeing, agreed. 


CHAPTER XXL 


vox POPULI. 


When the bonds of the earth are broken, 

When the fools of the time are free, 

When the last of the lies is spoken, 

The first of the truths awoken, 

When life shall begin to be ; 

Then sorrow and sin and sadness 
Shall turn to delight and gladness, 

And life be no longer madness, 

But love of the trinity. 

Liberty, 

Equality, 

Fraternity. 

Idylls of Insurrection. 

T he Cordeliers' Club exerted some influence, 
and believed that it exerted an enormous 
influence, upon the political thought and 
the political action of its time. The extremely 
advanced nature of its opinions won for it the ad- 
hesion of all manner of wild; generous, and impet- 
uous spirits, and when spirits are wild, generous, 
and impetuous, they must and will count as erratic 
factors in the great game of how things are not to 
be done. But it did not depend for its existence 


2TT 


212 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


merely upon the irresponsible or the irreconcila- 
ble ; it commanded solid men, earnest men, active 
men. And Budget, who was adored by the irre- 
sponsible for his glittering phrases and his resonant 
republicanism, had managed also to captivate the 
minds of the graver spirits, and to convince them 
of two things. The first thing was, that it was 
high time that the Cordeliers’ Club, which was be- 
ginning to establish affiliated bodies in all the great 
provincial towns, and even in many of the small 
ones, should have its own representative in Parlia- 
ment. The second thing was that the best possible 
man to be chosen as the mouthpiece of the Corde- 
liers was Stephen Budget himself. So when Swift 
entered the committee-room of the Cordeliers that 
night, some surprises awaited him. 

He had called for Budget in the afternoon, and 
had failed to find him at home. He had dined 
dismally enough at a place he used to haunt in the 
days before he knew Candida, and, when his melan- 
choly meal had ended, he had made his way due 
east to St. Ethelfreda’s Without. The moment he 
entered the committee-room of the club, he was 
convinced that matter of importance was toward. 
He was a little late, only a few minutes, but the 
Cordeliers, most of whom lived in the neighbor- 
hood, were habitually punctual, and the room was 
full when Swift made his appearance. He was 


vox POPULI. 


213 


greeted with a round of slightly ironical applause 
as he made his way to a vacant seat at the end of 
the long table directly facing a bust of Robespierre, 
which seemed to smile a thin-lipped smile of deri- 
sive welcome at him. Budget was sitting next to 
the chairman, with an air of satisfaction and im- 
portance upon his face, and the secretary of the 
club had just finished reading something aloud at 
the moment when Swift came into the room. 

As soon as he had finished, the chairman ad- 
dressed Swift, and put him in possession of the 
business they were discussing. In half a dozen 
clear, straightforward sentences he managed to 
surprise Swift as much as Swift had ever been sur- 
prised in his life. The committee of the Cordeliers 
had decided that it was for the interest of the cause 
and of the club that they should seek to make their 
influence felt at every election. There was an 
election just about to take place, the election for 
the Pine Hill Division of Surrey, left vacant by 
the sitting member’s application for the Chiltern 
Hundreds. The Cordeliers had resolved to con- 
test the seat, not so much with any great confidence 
of winning it, though they were by no means with- 
out hope, as at once to assert themselves as a seri- 
ous factor in active political life. The man whom 
they had unanimously resolved to select as their 
representative was Stephen Budget. 


214 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Here Stephen Budget drummed upon the table 
with his big fingers, and effected an air of states- 
manlike modesty. Swift stared at the chairman in 
amazement, but he was destined to be yet more 
amazed. For the chairman went on to say that 
after due deliberation the committee had resolved 
to send with Budget as his lieutenant in what must 
prove a memorable campaign, one of the ablest, 
the most illustrious, of their members, one who had 
endeared himself to advanced thought all over the 
country, one whose name was dear to every Corde- 
lier in the kingdom, the eminent author of The 
Cry for Liberty^ Brander Swift. 

A storm of applause greeted the conclusion of 
the chairman’s words. As he sat down Swift 
leaped to his feet amidst renewed and more vehe- 
ment cheering. It was evident that Swift’s long 
absence from their deliberations had not dimin- 
ished his popularity with the leading spirits of the 
Cordeliers, and it was with something as nearly ap- 
proaching to a thrill of pleasure as he had experi- 
enced that day that Swift listened to the applause, 
and waited until it had died away into silence. 
But what he had to say was not of a nature to re- 
kindle applause in the committee-room of the 
Cordeliers’ Club. Swift was generally a ready and 
an easy speaker ; he was always classed among the 
orators of whom the Cordeliers were most proud. 


vox POPULI. 


215 


and he was always listened to with enthusiasm, and 
interrupted by approval. But now he was unready, 
embarrassed, apologetic, full of protestations, and 
his apologies and his protestations were made to 
listeners who grew more and more unfavorable as 
Swift went on. 

Swift’s purpose was to decline the mission that 
had been so unexpectedly put upon him, and as 
the Cordeliers regarded the offer as an honor and 
as a signal proof of their forgiveness of Swift’s late 
indifference to his political duties, they were moved 
to an early resentment of his attitude. But their 
resentment increased when Swift went on to ex- 
plain the reason for his unwillingness to accept the 
unexpected honor. This was, forsooth, that the 
candidate whom the Cordeliers were about to op- 
pose, the reactionary, the champion of aristocracy, 
was a personal friend of Swift’s against whom Swift 
would find it painful, if not impossible, to work. 
For the first time in the history of the club, words 
spoken by the author of The Cry for Liberty were 
received with sounds of angry disapproval. Swift 
sat down, pale and excited, with very distasteful 
cries ringing in his ears. The smile on the bust 
of Robespierre seemed, as he glanced up at it, to 
be more derisive than ever. 

Several members of the committee rose to their 
feet in angry reprobation of what they regarded as 


2i6 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Swift’s treason to the principles of the organization. 
But Budget upreared his massive form from the 
table, and made it plain that he proposed to 
speak. 

Budget began by expressing his regret and his 
surprise at the words which had just fallen from 
his friend, and as he spoke the committee supported 
him with a sullen undertone of applause. But the 
speaker immediately went on to say that he could 
not help feeling much sympathy for Swift in the 
peculiar position in which Swift was placed, a posi- 
tion of whose extreme difficulty he himself was 
better qualified to judge than any other man there 
present. 

“ I love Anthony Windover,” he declared with 
a voice that was shaken as if by well-nigh uncon- 
querable sobs ; “ I love Anthony Windover the 
man, but not Anthony Windover the oppressor, 
and the more I love the one the more it is my 
duty, and the duty of every loyal Cordelier, to 
oppose the other.” 

And then, after an eloquent address to the aus- 
tere Roman virtues, he turned to Swift and appealed 
to him, in an appeal that had a kind of wild elo- 
quence in it, to play the Roman too, to show his 
unswerving, unalterable devotion to the cause that 
he adorned by obeying the behest of the institution 
they loved and served, even though that obedience 


vox POPULI. 217 

should force him to run counter to a commendable 
human instinct. 

The lead which had been so ingeniously given 
was. promptly followed. Member after member of 
the committee intensified the importance of the oc- 
casion, the austere grandeur of the sacrifice, until 
at last it seemed to the object of all this oratory 
that no more momentous matter was recorded in 
the chronicle of the age. 

What was Swift to do ? Dazed by the whirling 
words, irritated at the sudden and unwelcome dis- 
favor in which he found himself, bewildered by the 
importance attached to his action by a body of men 
in whom he had long believed. Swift saw no other 
courses open to him but surrender or secession. 
He had no wish to secede from the Cordeliers ; 
they represented his opinions, they championed his 
creed ; they had often been led by him, and it 
might well seem stubborn on his part to refuse their 
lead now in a case where, after all, he felt that they 
were in the right. There was, too, something in all 
the Roman father business which touched the senti- 
mentalism in Swift and flattered him against his 
will. 

Candida ought to admire him, he thought, for 
this splendid sacrifice of friendship upon the altar 
of patriotism, even if her sense of irony tempted 
her to smile at the proportions to which the conces- 


2I8 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


sion sought to inflate itself. So, with the image of 
Candida in his mind, Swift rose and in a few brief 
words announced to the committee that he placed 
himself at their disposition. 

The revulsion of feeling was complete. Swift 
had scarcely finished his sentence of concession 
before he found that he had not merely conquered 
his new unpopularity, but regained all, and more 
than all, his old popularity. The chairman meta- 
phorically wept tears of joy over him ; Budget 
eulogized him in glowing periods, which he con- 
cluded with an apposite quotation from The Cry for 
Liberty^ which brought the blood to Swift’s cheeks, 
because it reminded him of Candida, who had once 
cited to him that very sentence and asked him what 
it meant. 

After such an emotional episode, even the aus- 
terity of the Cordeliers felt itself unsuited to a 
struggle with further business. Fortunately, there 
was little further business to discuss, and'^so they 
broke up. Every member of the committee in turn 
pressed up to Swift before leaving, and wrung his 
hand, assuring him at the same time, in language 
of identical fervor and of almost identical phrase, 
that he had deserved well of the country, and that 
the Cordeliers were proud of their gifted son. All 
of which Swift took in good part, with that not 
unpleasing sense of exaltation which usually accom- 


vox POPULI. 


219 


panics the reaction of compliment upon condemna- 
tion. It was hard indeed not to believe his friends 
when they assured him that he was indeed a very 
fine fellow who would have adorned the proudest 
period of the Revolution, 

But that exhilaration of the sense which flattery 
fans in the impressionable fell away sensibly when 
the stimulating influence was removed. At Bud- 
get’s request Swift waited for him, that they might 
make their way home together. Budget had a few 
words to say to the chairman ; he was one of those 
politicians who have always a few words to say to 
somebody after everybody else has gone ; and while 
he whispered with him in a corner, Swift looked 
round upon the almost deserted room with a re- 
vived melancholy. The place looked gaunt and 
cold, with its whitewashed walls and glaring gas- 
lights. The busts on their brackets — Marat, Robes- 
pierre, Danton, and St. Just, one for each side of 
the room — did not seem so inspiriting as he had 
found them of old time. He thought of Candida, 
and sighed to himself,^ and wondered if it was right 
and wise for a patriot ever to fall in love. He felt 
unnerved, irresolute, and he shivered as if the world 
had suddenly grown cold. 

He and Budget walked home together all the way 
from St. Ethelfreda’s Without to Bloomsbury. If 
was a long walk, but it did not seem too long to 


220 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Swift, who was very willing to kill time, and Jt did 
not seem too long to his companion, who talked the 
whole time about himself, and his prospects and 
his ambitions. He had no serious expectation of 
winning the election, but it cost him nothing ; the 
campaign was paid for by those in the background 
who filled the exchequer of the party. It would 
put him prominently before the country ; it was 
the first decisive step on the way to Westminster. 
He decided to go down the next day to the seat of 
war. Swift promised to follow him in a day or two, 
pleading that he had business to look after which 
must be settled before he left London. On that 
understanding they parted at the door of Budget’s 
lodging. 


CHAPTER XXII. 


THE INVASION OF BULLFORD. 

Oh, ’t is most vile 

To fight upon the one side, while one’s heart 
Throbs ever responsive to the thought of them 
That lead the other battle. 

The Devil's Comedy. 

S WIFT lingered in London for a few days in 
the vain hope that he might hear something 
from Candida. Candida had vanished as 
completely as if she had never been, and there 
were moments when Swift asked himself in a kind 
of wonder whether, after all, he had not dreamed 
a dream of all those delightful weeks. Then, in a 
rage, he made up his mind to wait no longer, and 
took a train to Bullford, the chief town of the Pine 
Hill Division of Surrey. He was not in the best 
of humors, nor in the best of spirits, as he niched 
himself in the corner of a third-class carriage and 
gave himself up to the process of reflection. But 
he could think consequently upon nothing ; his 
mind was all broken up, as it were, into a confused 
succession of pictures of all the events of the re- 


221 


222 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


cent enchanted weeks, which now seemed as unreal 
as Avallon. 

Swift came down to Bullford with an aching 
heart. He hated the whole business. He thought 
that Budget had acted with very bad taste in forc- 
ing a contest upon an old friend in a constituency 
where he seemed to have not the remotest chance 
of success. Budget was an old friend, too, but an 
old friend in a very different sense from Windover. 
Windover, to whose opinions he was diametrically 
opposed, he did respect, because he knew that Win- 
dover’s opinions were honest opinions, earnestly 
formulated and conscientiously adhered to. Bud- 
get’s opinions he assumed, in his heart of hearts, 
to be no more than the opinions of a political con- 
dottiere^ who was ready to swing his sword and cry 
his war-cry on whichever side seemed to him to 
promise victory and the spoils of victory. So 
Swift had it in his heart to curse the very man 
whom he was sent down from London to bless, 
and, as far as in him lay, to comfort. 

As the train steamed into Bullford, Swift leaned 
out of the window, and looked about him for Bud- 
get, who had promised to come and meet him at 
the station. There were a good many people on 
the platform, evidently awaiting the arrival of the 
train, but he could not discover Budget amongst 
the number, He was not greatly surprised, for he 


THE INVASION OF BULLFORD. 223 


knew Budget too well to count with any confidence 
upon his keeping any promise or any appointment. 

As the train came to a stop Swift leapt out of 
his carriage only to find himself, to his surprise 
and somewhat to his regret, face to face with Lu- 
cilla. She seemed quite as surprised to see him, 
but there was no suggestion of regret in her frank 
eyes as she held out her hand. 

“Well, Brander,” said Lucilla, “what are you 
doing here ? Are you going to tug a laboring oar 
in this galley ? ” 

“ Need you ask?” he answered. “I am sorry 
to say I must, and in the other ship too.” 

“ Of course,” said Lucilla, gravely. “ But why 
should you be sorry ? You are bound to fight for 
your flag, and I hope you don’t think that it will 
make any difference to us.” 

“ You dear, good girl, I know that— know it 
well,” he answered warmly. “ But I am sorry all 
the same, because I hate to seem to go against 
Windover in anything, and because, because — 
well, of course, I ’m proud of my flag, but I ’m not 
quite so proud of my standard-bearer.” 

“ I understand your feelings,” Lucilla said softly. 
“ But it cannot be helped. We are both doing our 
duty. But forgive me, I am wanted. We have 
come here to-day to meet friends, and I see Sir 
Charles is beckoning to me.” 


224 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“Well,” said Swift, “good-bye. I wish that I 
could wish you all the success that you are sure to 
have.” 

They shook hands again. A gray-haired, hand- 
some country gentleman — Swift learned afterwards 
that it was Sir Charles Amber — had come to Lu- 
cilla, and she moved away. Swift gave up his 
ticket, and passed from the station out into the 
streets of Bullford. 

Budget was stopping, as Swift knew, at the Blue 
Boar Inn. It was not the best, nor the most fa- 
mous inn in Bullford, but it was the most tolerant. 
The most famous inn in Bullford was, without 
doubt, the Angel, whose fame had been hymned 
by Jack Harris in a ballad with the overword 
which declared that “ The Angel ’s an excellent 
inn.” Opinions were divided amongst visitors to 
and residents in Bullford as to the best inn between 
the Angel and the Swan. But the Angel and the 
Swan were not hostelries for Budget, although, as 
his expenses were being paid, he would have pre- 
ferred to seek their shelter. The Angel was by 
old tradition the headquarters of Tory feeling in 
the town ; the Swan represented an elderly Whig- 
gism which would have stretched a point to wel- 
come a conventional Liberal candidate, but which 
would lend no countenance to the doctrines that 
Budget professed to cherish. So he had brought 


THE INVASION OF BULLFORD. 225 


up at the Blue Boar, a very comfortable specimen 
of the old-fashioned inn of the good old posting 
days. Though it was fairly well-to-do, it could not 
afford to pick and choose its customers as its migh- 
tier rivals could, and it accepted Budget, if not with 
open arms, at least with a decent show of civility. 

Swift found his way to the Blue Boar easily 
enough without asking his way. He knew that it 
was on the High Street, a privilege it shared with 
all the other inns of Bullford, and he knew that if 
he walked on the High Street long enough he must 
come to it. And come to it he did, almost at the 
end of High Street, its old-fashioned sign of a 
Blue Boar, that was very blue and very bristly and 
very tusky and very red-eyed and portentous gen- 
erally, creaking softly as it swayed in the gentle 
evening wind. 

The Blue Boar received Swift with courtesy as 
a stranger, with a colder courtesy as a friend of 
Stephen Budget. The Blue Boar, in the person of 
a stout landlady in black, condescended to admit 
that she believed that Mr. Budget was in his sit- 
ting-room. The Blue Boar, in the person of a de- 
cidedly pretty chambermaid, who looked with some 
approval upon the unconscious Swift, led the way 
up a flight of curiously flat short steps that made 
you feel infinitely tired before you had got half 

way to the Crescent ; for the Blue Boar adhered 
15 


226 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


loyally to the old custom of dignifying the princi- 
pal rooms with names, and the Crescent had been 
set aside for the use and benefit of the slightly un- 
welcome visitor to the town. 

Swift found Budget enthroned in the gloomy 
splendor of the Crescent. He was seated by the 
open window in his shirt-sleeves, and was yawning 
noisily over a volume which he put down as the 
door opened, and which proved to be one of Zola’s 
novels. His legs were comfortably arranged across 
one chair, his body was comfortably ensconced 
into an arm-chair, and he made no effort to rise 
as Swift entered, but contented himself with wav- 
ing his guest a welcome with his large hand. 

“ My dear boy,” he said, with that air of desper- 
ate friendliness which it pleased Budget to assume, 
“ I ’m delighted to see you. I meant to get down 
to the station to meet you, but I heard that friends 
were coming for the other side and I thought that 
damned London slut would be there to meet them, 
so I thought I would just stay where I was.” 

“ May I ask,” said Swift, “ who is the ‘ damned 
London slut ’ of whom you speak ? ” 

Budget yawned again, but this time his face wore 
a pleased look — the look that Swift knew there so 
well, his look of pleasure whenever chance gave 
him the opportunity to say something uncivil of a 


woman. 


THE INVASION OF BULLFORD. 22/ 

“ Why, that confounded Carteret girl, of course 
— the silly little fool who must always be meddling 
with things that she does n’t in the least understand.” 

“ Is n’t she a very clever woman ? ” Swift asked. 
All that he had ever heard vaguely about Dorothy 
Carteret had pointed to that conclusion. 

‘‘ She is a beast ! ” Budget growled. 

Swift felt and looked shocked, for he hated to 
hear a woman so spoken of. 

“ Bah ! ” said Budget with a great yawn, while 
he flapped at his hot face with a dingy handker- 
chief. “ All women are beasts.” 

He delivered himself oracularly, as one who 
might not be questioned, as one who knew. But 
in deference to a half-inarticulate protest from 
Swift, he condescended to amplify his theme. 

“ I do not say,” he went on, that men are not 
beasts also — quite the contrary. We are barren 
knaves all, every man jack of us. But, after ma- 
ture consideration, I think that the women are the 
worst. Have you ever considered, my dear Swift, 
upon the physical processes incidental to, and in- 
evitable to, the life of the loveliest woman that ever 
lived ? ” 

Swift shook his head. He did not care to argue 
with his chief when he was in this mood. Budget 
did not notice, or did not understand, his silence, 
but, being fairly started, was well pleased to ram- 


228 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


ble on, spinning out like some fat spider the threads 
of his tainted philosophy. 

“ Women,” he said with a grin, “ are essential to 
a man, but not a woman. In the main, women are 
all alike ; it is only the accidental that differenti- 
ates. What you and I want of women is, after all, 
the main thing ” — here Swift, unheeded, shook his 
head in angry protest — “ and the accidentals merely 
interest by the way.” 

The leering face of the man, his foul philosophy, 
his foul speech, all grew sickeningly repugnant to 
Swift. He thought of one beautiful face with a 
kind of passion, of adoration, that made him long 
to hit Stephen hard, there where he sprawled. But 
he remembered in time that it would scarcely do 
much good to the cause if it became bruited abroad 
that the advanced candidate and his principal 
henchman had begun their political campaign by 
a bout at fisticuffs. So he restrained his honor- 
able ambition. But he got up. 

“ If you don’t mind,” he said, “ I think I will go 
to my room and bestow my things there.” 

The words seemed to suddenly touch some chord 
in Budget’s conscience. “Your room?” he said 
dubiously, “ I am exceedingly sorry, but somehow 
it never occurred to me. Of course you will want 
a room. If you will just give a pull to the bell, 
we will have old Goody Trot upstairs and tell her.” 


THE INVASION OF BULLFORD. 


** Oh no, don’t bother. I ’ll go down and ar- 
range things with her,” said Swift. And catching 
up his bag, he hurried out of the room, divided 
between disgust at Budget’s views of life and a 
kind of amazed admiration of his indomitable 
egotism. 

He got a room easily enough, a bedroom on a 
higher floor than his leader’s. It was a pleasant, 
old-fashioned room, with a faint smell of lavender 
and rose-leaves about it — a room of a sort still to 
be met with in the more ancient kind of country 
inns, a room that suggested home, with its scrupu- 
lously clean linen and its formal, antique furniture. 
The room had a lattice window that gave on to 
the High Street ; the window was open, and the 
warm evening air came sweetly into the room. 
Swift sat by the open window, and, leaning on his 
folded arms, looked out into the street, surveying 
the scene and the passers-by with the interest that 
every new place aroused in him, and meditating 
the while upon the condition of his fortunes. 

The keenest sensation of which he was conscious 
was still a sense of ache at the mysterious sepa- 
ration from Candida. Her face came between him 
and every visible object ; the sound of her voice 
seemed still to be whispering in his ears, and to 
make him heedless of all other sounds. 

During the divine weeks that had gone by, and 


230 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


that now seemed as if they were gone forever, he 
had been too entirely happy to question anything, 
to consider anything. He had found it enough to 
be with Candida, to be near Candida, to hold her 
always in his heart and mind, and to spend in her 
company every permissible moment, to be idle and 
to be happy, and to love in silence. But now — 
now that they were no longer together, now that so 
exquisite, so intimate a friendship had been so 
strangely severed — he seemed to find himself sud- 
denly face to face again with the great facts of life. 
What did it all mean ? what was going to happen ? 
how was it going to end ? Shall I ever see her 
again ? he asked himself with a sob in his voice, 
and he let his face fall upon his folded arms and 
moaned softly to himself, for very longing and very 
loneliness. 

A clatter in the silent street roused him from 
the melancholy of his reverie. He looked up ; to 
his surprise, and partly to his shame, he found that 
his eyes were filmed with tears, and that he looked 
upon the street as through a mist. A handsome 
open carriage drawn by a pair of black horses 
came sweeping down the High Street, attracting 
the admiring attention of every passer-by. Swift, 
looking at it indifferently through his tear-dimmed 
eyes, barely noted that there were occupants — a 
pair of men, a pair of women. But as the carriage 


THE INVASION OF BULLFORD. 23 1 

passed under his window he gave a start, and a cry 
rose to his lips, for his mind was suddenly stabbed 
with the fancy that he had seen a face that was the 
face of Candida in the passing carriage. He 
leaned forward full of excitement, but his eyes 
were still wet, and before they were dry the car- 
riage was far away on the road. He drew back 
into the room again with a shrug of the shoul- 
ders. 

“ I must be in a bad way,” he said to himself, 
“ when I come to see her face at every hand’s turn 
in this fashion. I must pull myself together, or I 
shall be of very little use down here. Let us go 
down and dine with Budget ; there is no senti- 
mentalism about him, at all events.” 

So he dined with Budget, and the dinner was not 
disagreeable, for Stephen liked to make himself 
comfortable, and liked others to be comfortable, 
for his own sake, so long as they were in his com- 
pany. It seemed that the Blue Boar had some very 
good champagne, and they drank that. Budget 
carefully explaining to Swift that he paid for it 
himself, not out of the election fund, but out of 
his own earnings as a journalist. Budget was in 
one of his more amiable moods, and after they 
had arranged their political plan of campaign he 
turned the talk away from politics to books, and 
they sat in the little room till quite late talking 


232 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


about their favorite novels. The curious thing 
about Stephen was an element in him of love for 
literature. He had no knowledge whatever of for- 
eign languages, but thanks to the benevolence of 
translations he had read widely, if loosely, in the 
literatures of several tongues, had something more 
than a superficial acquaintance with their fiction, 
and expressed his loves and hates with a copious- 
ness of sonorous phrase and an extravagant vehe- 
mence that entertained Swift vastly. When they 
parted. Swift went to his room and to bed, and fell 
asleep, and dreamed that he was back in London 
again, and that he was looking for Candida, and 
that he could not find her anywhere. He awoke 
in the bright morning with the pain of this dream 
depressing him. 


CHAPTER XXIII. 


A WOODLAND WONDER. 

How came you here, my pretty maid, 

In this enchanted woodland glade ? 

What summons from the Fairies’ Court 
Wafted your beauty here to sport 
With my poor soul, that long has seen 
You for its conqueror and queen ? 

A Pastoral in Pink. 

S WIFT always rose early, and he was up be- 
times next morning. He breakfasted alone, 
for Budget was an incorrigible lie-abed, who 
would never willingly face the world before noon. 

While Swift was still at breakfast there came a 
knock to the door, followed by the entrance of the 
pretty waiting-maid, who handed Swift a letter. 
Swift took it with some surprise, but as the girl 
told him, even in the act, that it had just been left 
by hand, he guessed that it might be from Lucilla. 
But it was written in an unfamiliar hand, that 
seemed like a woman's. It bore no address ; it 
carried no signature. Its contents were couched 
in the form almost of a command, but of a com- 
mand uttered with graciousness. 


233 


234 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


‘‘Will Mr. Swift be so kind as to wait by the 
gate of The Towers plantation at nine o’clock this 
morning ? If he will walk on the main road from 
Bullford for about a mile and a half he will come 
to a cross-road branching to the left and pointing 
to Pine Hill. Half a mile along this road a path 
branches off to the right and leads to a gate. This 
is the gate of The Towers plantation. It is to be 
hoped that Mr. Swift will find it possible to come.” 

Swift put the letter down with some surprise. 
He knew absolutely nobody in the neighborhood 
with the exception of Windover and Lucilla, and 
there could be no imaginable reason for his old 
friends to communicate with him in such an ec- 
centric fashion. It might be some kind of joke, 
Swift thought for a moment, but it did not read 
like a joke, and once again his ignorance of any 
acquaintanceship in the neighborhood made it un- 
likely that * any one should want to play a trick 
upon him. It seemed like a mystery, but it might 
prove, after all, to be a simple matter. It was in 
all probability, in some way or other, connected 
with the election. In any case the simplest way 
of solving the problem was to obey the instruc- 
tions contained in the letter. 

It was now a few minutes past eight o’clock. A 
practised walker like Swift had plenty of time to 


A WOODLAND WONDER. 


235 


cover the couple of miles and be well beforehand 
at his appointment, even making allowance for 
possible difficulties in finding his way — difficulties 
which the precision of his correspondent seemed 
to make improbable. So Swift took up his cap 
and stick, left word with the girl for Budget that 
he would not be gone long, and set out upon his 
enterprise. 

It was a delightful morning. The air was sweet 
and fresh, the sky was filled with sunlight ; the 
road spread away white before him, as soon as he 
had got outside the town, with an alluring invita- 
tion to briskness of motion. Swift dearly loved a 
good road, and this seemed one of the best roads 
in the world, for now it had great trees on both 
sides so frequently as to make it almost an avenue, 
and now there were great slopes of meadows that 
seemed to stretch away into the sky, and now there 
were the tended parks of great estates, and now 
there were well-timbered coppices and thickly 
planted runs of pine-trees, and all the variety 
seemed to blend harmoniously, and the sound of 
his feet on the highway seemed to keep time to 
the eternal song of the road. 

It was not long before Swift came to the cross- 
road and the finger-post that pointed to Pine Hill. 
The road he took now was narrower than the main 
road. It seemed to lie between two great estates 


236 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


that were separated from the road by ditches and 
high banks topped with trees, and even in the 
strength of the morning sun the road was com- 
paratively cool and shady, and its whiteness was 
all dappled with the shadows of the overarching 
boughs and leaves. 

Suddenly the bank at his right-hand side came 
to an end and turned off to the right. Another 
bank began again a few feet farther on, and be- 
tween the two there lay a narrow pathway that 
looked rather more like a gully than a road. Look- 
ing up this pathway. Swift saw that it led along and 
up between two estates or two divisions of one es- 
tate well into the woods, and some considerable 
way ahead he could see that there was a gateway. 
This was clearly his course, so he turned aside from 
the shady road and struck boldly into the gully. 

On both sides of him now the banks rose so high 
and the trees were so close that the way was darker 
than it had been, and the sunlight could only send 
a few arrows of gold upon the thick carpet of dead 
red leaves, and the myriads of pine-needles that 
crackled beneath Swift’s feet as he tramped along. 
The path inclined steadily from the road he had 
quitted, and he could not walk as quickly as he 
had done hitherto ; but a few minutes of climbing 
up and into the heart of the land brought him to 
a wooden gate. It was not a gate that seemed to 


A WOODLAND WONDER. 


237 


be set up with any thought of excluding anyone, 
for though it stood across the path at a point where 
the two banks seemed to narrow, it would be per- 
fectly easy for anyone to get round it by the simple 
process of climbing the bank on either side. As if 
conscious of this anomaly in its existence, the gate 
swung idly on its hinges, disdaining to assume a 
virtue it did not possess. Beyond this gate the path 
that Swift had been pursuing trailed off among the 
pine-trees, winding away till it seemed to become 
little more than a squirrel track. 

Swift leaned against the gate and looked over 
into the warm darkness of the woods. 

“ This is my goal, I suppose,” he said to himself. 
“Ah, if it were only Wishing-gate ! ” 

A squirrel ran out from the roots of a tree, and 
stood still for a moment to stare with its bright eyes 
at Swift. Swift stared back at it. Swift kept so 
quiet where he stood that he did not seem to alarm 
the squirrel by his presence. The little animal 
stood up, daintily poised, in an attitude of amiable 
recognition of a tranquil presence. Swift looked 
intently at the animal, so prettily sylvan in its rus- 
set coat, and he remembered how Thoreau could 
tempt such wild kindred of the wood to his hand, 
and he envied him the companionable wood-magic. 
His eyes, fixed upon the squirrel, were averted from 
the woodland path beyond the gate ; his ears, dulled 


238 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


by the roar of cities, did not hear what the squirrel 
heard — the sound of footsteps lightly approaching 
between the trees. In a moment it had darted 
across the path and flung itself half-way up the 
trunk of a tall and ancient pine. Swift’s eyes, lifted 
to follow it in its flight, saw the cause of its dis- 
comfiture. Someone was coming quickly along the 
path through the trees towards him. The some- 
body was a woman. Then, on the instant. Swift, 
taken by surprise and unawares, gave a kind of cry 
of surprise, which sent the squirrel speeding for 
dear life, as near to the blue of heaven as the sixty 
feet of pine-trunk permitted. For the woman was 
Candida. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 

O love ! my love ! for one warm answering kiss 
To my appealing, passionate kisses, take 
My heart and soul. The one is yours to break, 

The other yours for either bale or bliss. 

The Love- Sonnets of Lucullus. 

H ardly ‘ knowing what he was doing, Swift 
swung back the gate, and ran to greet the 
advancing figure. It was indeed Candida, 
and she was moving to meet him with eyes that 
were bright with smiles. 

“ Candida,” he gasped, “ what does this mean ? ” 
It was a commonplace question to ask at such a 
moment, but when human beings speak under the 
sudden influence of some strong excitement they 
generally express themselves in some exceedingly 
commonplace, conventional formula of words. 

Candida laughed at his astonishment, and the 
sound of her laughter thrilled him with all the old 
delight. 

“ Are you very much surprised to see me ? ” she 
said. 


239 


240 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ I am indeed,” he said. “ I do not understand, 
do not realize it at all. My head is in a whirl.” 

“ The world is a little world,” she said, “ even 
for wanderers. We have not wandered very far, 
you and I, and, all things considered, it is not very 
surprising that we should have wandered to the 
same place. Are we not well met ? ” 

“We are well met indeed,” he answered-; “but 
the meeting is a mystery.” 

“ Mysteries are amusing sometimes,” she inter- 
rupted quickly. 

There was something audaciously provocative in 
the way her eyes danced and her -lips smiled that 
made Swift’s heart beat fast. But he felt a strange 
sense of unfamiliarity, of perplexity that almost 
frightened him. 

“ What trick are you playing upon me ? ” he 
asked with a laugh that sounded even to himself 
to be rather forced and mirthless. “ How do we 
come to meet in this corner of the world, and in 
The Towers woods?” 

“ That is an easy question to answer,” she said. 
“ You came here because you were asked to come, 
and were too courteous to refuse, even though you 
did not know the handwriting. I came here be- 
cause I wanted to see you.” 

“ But how do you come to be here fit all ? ” said 
Swift, “ That is what surprises me.” 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 241 

For a moment the amusement seemed to fade a 
little from the girl’s face — only for a moment ; then 
it was all mirth again. 

“ I came here because I had to come here,” she 
said. “ I am the companion of a young lady, of a 
wilful young lady, and where she goes I must needs 
follow.” 

“You are a companion,” he said slowly. “I do 
not understand. Whose and how ? ” 

“ Perhaps I was tired of independence,” Candida 
answered ; “ perhaps I thought I would like to be 
a little less poor ; perhaps I was tempted to make 
a new experiment in life. I think I told you once 
that I believed life ought to be a series of experi- 
ments. Well, I tried the experiment of the lonely 
life. Now I am trying the experiment of the sub- 
servient life. I am the companion of a young lady 
who is staying on a visit at The Towers.” 

“Not of Miss Dorothy Carteret?” Swift asked, 
with much surprise and some regret. 

Candida nodded her head. 

“ Even so ; you have guessed it. I am the com- 
panion of Miss Dorothy Carteret, and as she seems 
to have taken a kind of fancy to me for the mo- 
ment, she will not be without me, and I must go 
where she goes, and when she pleases, for she is a 
very imperious young woman.” 

It seemed to Swift that it was Candida who ought 


242 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


to have the right to be imperious, that Candida 
ought not to bend before the imperiousness of 
others. His thoughts darkened his mood, and 
darkened his face also, and the girl read his face, 
and laughed again with a note of mockery in her 
laughter. 

“ Do you think I have done wrong to become the 
companion of a fashionable, much-spoiled, over- 
praised, rich, conceited young woman ? The situa- 
tion has its amusing sides.” 

Swift’s voice was as grave as his face, and he an- 
swered very slowly after a moment’s pause : 

“ The situation is more amusing to you, perhaps, 
than it seems to me. Was it for this that you left 
me so suddenly, so strangely, so capriciously ? Was 
it for this that you made me so miserable, when I 
was so happy ? ” 

“You should remember,” Candida said, with an 
imperious ring in her voice, “ that it was understood 
from the beginning that I was free to act as I 
pleased, just as you were free to act as you pleased. 
There was no bond whatever between us but the 
bond of inclination.” 

“ And are you free from that bond now ? ” Swift 
asked almost sullenly, as he tried with no great suc- 
cess to return the steady composure of her gaze 
with a like steadiness, with a like composure. 

“You have no right to ask me,” Candida an- 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 243 


swered, “ and you have certainly no right to com- 
plain. I might have gone without a word if I chose, 
and you would have had no right to blame me. 
But I wrote to you, but I told you that we should 
meet again soon. Well, I have kept my word ; we 
have met again soon. Are you sorry for that ? ” 
Her voice had been hard up to this moment, but 
now it suddenly softened, as she asked in a lower 
tone : 

“ Poor fellow ! did you miss me very much ? ” 
Swift sighed, but his face brightened. 

“ Much ? Much ? Ah, I can’t tell you how 
much ! ” 

Candida immediately interrupted him. 

“ Then please don’t try. It might lead us beyond 
the bounds of our bond. Let us be content to know 
that we have found each other again, and that if I 
am playing a new game with life, you are still one 
of the pieces on the board. Tell me frankly, what 
do you think of my new game ? ” 

It was Swift’s turn now to frown, and he an- 
swered very slowly : 

“ I do not know : it seems strange. Do you like 
the kind of life ? Is she nice to you ? ” 

“ I am not sure that she is always very nice to 
me,” the girl answered frankly. “ I do not think 
she is always very nice to any one in this wide world. 
But she is a very curious woman, and she does in- 


244 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


terest me very much, and so you see I find my ac- 
count in that, and make experience my reward.” 

“ I suppose you know why she has come down 
here ? ” Swift said gloomily. “ And I suppose you 
know why I have come down here ? ” 

“ Oh yes,” Candida answered, daintily mimick- 
ing his melancholy tone. “ She has come down 
here to do everything in her power to support the 
candidature of Mr. Windover, and you have come 
down here to support the candidature of Mr. Bud- 
get. So you and she are fighting on opposite sides 
in a great battle.” 

“ And I suppose you are on her side, too ? ” Swift 
said. “ This is an ugly, an intolerable business. 
Here am I, compelled to fight against the best friend 
I have in the world, and now the woman I love best 
in the world is against me too. Was there ever 
such queer luck ? ” 

He spoke with such an air of bitter dishearten- 
ment that the girl stopped laughing. 

“ It does not follow that I am against you,” she 
said, speaking more gently than she had yet spoken. 
“ Candida Knox does not always think as Dorothy 
Carteret thinks, or do as Dorothy Carteret does. I 
shall play no part at all in this great struggle, and 
we shall meet as friends.” 

“ How shall we meet ? ” he asked. “ I know noth- 
ing of your friends, and they know nothing of me.” 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 245 


“We shall meet,” she said, “if you will, as we 
have met this morning. I am an early riser, and 
Miss Carteret does not trouble me in the morning 
hours. Will you come here every morning at this 
hour, and walk in these lonely woods ? ” 

She spoke the word “ lonely” with the slightest 
imaginable emphasis, just enough to suggest their 
isolation in those stretches of silent pine woods, 
where no one ever seemed to stray. They had 
been walking slowly for some little time now along 
the faintly defined path that led away into the 
heart of the plantation, and they seemed to be as 
far from human observation or from human influ- 
ences as if they were wandering in a virgin forest. 

“ How can I,” he said, “ with this blessed elec- 
tion on my hands ? I am pledged to do all I can 
for our man.” 

“ You surely are not afraid that I should ever 
ask you to fall short of any sense of duty,” Can- 
dida answered. “ I know that you would always 
do what you think right, and I admire you for it. 
But you know very well that this election is not a 
serious game. Your people are playing it for bluff. 
Your man has as much chance of getting in here 
as he has of being made Prime Minister. He sim- 
ply asserts himself ; it gives him a claim upon the 
party, makes him a personage, the man who fought 
Pine Hill for the extremists. You will do all you 


246 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

can, of course ; but you will find there is little to 
do, and nothing at all that need prevent you from 
taking a morning walk with Miss Carteret's com- 
panion.” 

“ I wish you were not Miss Carteret's compan- 
ion,” Swift said. 

“ So do I sometimes,” said Candida. “ But that 
can't be helped now. “ But even if I were Miss 
Carteret's servant, would you be any the less my 
friend ? ” 

There was an element of disdain in her words 
which Swift hastily deprecated. 

“ You know very well that there is nothing in 
the whole world that gives me so much joy as 
being with you. You know very well that if I had 
had my way we should be together always. It is 
because you are so dear to me that I dread condi- 
tions which seem to divide us ; it is because I love 
you that my joy in finding you again is shadowed 
by the fear that in the interval I have partly lost 
you.” 

“You have lost nothing in the interval,” Candida 
said quietly. “ Companionship with Miss Carteret 
has altered me in no way. But because I am Miss 
Carteret's companion, and therefore a guest at The 
Towers, and because you are the friend of the op- 
position candidate, it is of course clear that you 
cannot come to see me at The Towers, or I come 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 247 

to see you at your candidate’s committee-rooms. 
These woods are a neutral zone, this morning hour 
a neutral time. If you are by fortune a Montagu ; 
if I am by odd chance allied with the house of 
Capulet, we have, at least, a very poetic precedent 
for such stolen meetings. Or does your sense of 
duty boggle at them ? ” 

“ So long as I see you,” he said, “ all is well with 
me. There is no joy on earth like the joy of being 
near you, of seeing you, of hearing your voice, of 
holding, for a moment, your hand. What you 
choose I choose, and what you wish I wish, for I 
know that it would be impossible for you to wish 
me to do anything against my honor and my duty.” 

“ Are you so very sure of that,” she said. “ I 
dare not be so confident about myself, for I know 
that I am a daughter of whims and fancies. Well, 
it is understood that we meet here in the mornings 
in the greenwood, like Robin and Marian of old 
time. It will be most romantic, will it not ? — and 
so good-bye.” 

She held out her hand in token of farewell. He 
took it. Their eyes met, and his saw a look in 
hers — a look that seemed to be neither wonder nor 
amusement nor disdain nor pity, but that was com- 
pounded of all these qualities — that provoked and 
denied. An uncontrollable impulse seemed to 
seize him, and almost before he could realize what 


248 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


he meant to do he had let go her hand, had caught 
her in his arms, and, holding her body tightly to 
him, kissed her lips again and again and again. 

Candida made no resistance. Her body rested 
passively in his arms, her mouth submitted, unre- 
sponsive, to his kisses. Her eyes, unclosed still, 
wore the same strange expression. 

He must have kissed her some twenty times 
without the slightest resistance on her part, but 
without the slightest response. Then suddenly 
she slipped her hand between his mouth and hers. 

“ Stop,” she said quite quietly and firmly. 

Her strength was as nothing to his, and he could 
have overcome her resistance with scarcely an ef- 
fort, but no such thought stained his mind. At the 
sound of her voice his passion chilled from mad- 
ness to reason, and he set her free without a word. 
She moved a very little way from him and looked 
at him, and he, gazing piteously at her, read in her 
look neither anger nor sorrow. Her face had 
flushed a little under the fury of his kisses, other- 
wise she seemed wholly unmoved. 

“ You have broken your promise,” she said very 
softly, and her voice had no ring of indignation. 

“ Forgive me,” he said humbly, “ I could not 
help it — I could not help it.” 

He was bitterly angry with himself for having 
broken his word and betrayed his weakness, and 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 249 

yet, in spite of his shame and rage, he thrilled with 
a fierce joy to think that he had been false to his 
promise and that he had kissed her mouth so many 
times. 

“ I suppose not,” she said. “ Some promises are 
harder to keep than others. Oh yes, I forgive you ! 
We will forgive and forget — both of us.” 

“ I cannot forget,” Swift murmured ; “ I shall 
never forget. I have broken my word ; I have be- 
haved vilely, if you will ; I am ashamed of myself 
with all my heart ; but I shall never forget — ah, 
no, I shall never forget.” 

The look of curiosity in her eyes gave way for 
an instant to a look of melancholy. 

“Well,” she said, “remember if you must, but 
do not force me to remember. But remember this, 
also, that when I come here I place myself under 
your protection ; I trust my honor to your honor, 
because I believe in you. Give me your word that 
you will not again err, and I will believe you and 
blot out these moments, and meet you here again, 
as I promised. But if you feel that you cannot 
honestly promise this, and loyally keep your prom- 
ise, say so now like a frank friend and a brave man, 
and I will come here no more.” 

“I promise,” said Swift. “You need not fear 
that I shall break my word. You may believe me 
indeed.” 


250 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

“I know that I may,” she answered. “Very 
well, then. You will be here again to-morrow at 
nine?” 

“ I will be here,” Swift said. “ And you — you 
will be here ? It is like a dream to see you to-day, 
to hope to see you to-morrow.” 

“ I will be here,” Candida replied. “ But stay ; 
something might happen then or at another time to 
delay the one or the other of us. Let it be under- 
stood between us that if one of us fails to keep 
tryst within a quarter of an hour of the appointed 
time it will be understood that something unavoid- 
able has prevented him or her from coming. Do 
you agree to that ? ” 

“ I do indeed,” Swift said ; “ but I hope that 
the prudently foreseen may not come to pass.” 

“ I hope so, too,” laughed Candida ; “You can 
find your path through the woods all right. Then, 
good-bye till to-morrow.” 

She turned and ran quickly into the woods, and 
kept on running slowly without looking back until 
she was lost to sight among the trees. Swift stood 
and looked after her as long as he could catch the 
least glimpse of her figure flitting among the tree- 
trunks. When she had disappeared, he too turned 
on his heel, and walked slowly back along the track 
by which they had come. To have seen Candida 
again was a rapture ; and yet, he could scarcely 


IN THE HEART OF THE WOOD. 2$ I 

tell how, she seemed to have altered — vaguely, in- 
definably. He could not quite analyze the altera- 
tion, but he felt that it existed, and he asked 
himself if it were due to the new part Candida was 
playing in life, as the companion of Dorothy Car- 
teret. Again, if he had experienced a joy beyond 
words in those mad moments while he held Can- 
dida in his arms and kissed her lips, the indiffer- 
ence with which she received his kisses, and the 
unruffled graciousness with which she had forgiven 
what he called his brutality, had a chilling effect 
upon his thoughts. While he never dared to hope 
that Candida could love him, it was discouraging 
to find that his kisses could neither kindle response 
nor arouse anger. 

In fine, he was perplexed, enchanted, fired and 
baffled, and as he walked slowly through the scented 
woods he was tortured by a thousand fears and a 
thousand fancies. Through them all there shone 
the unquestionable joy of having seen Candida 
again, and the troublous joy of having kissed her. 
He felt, now that he was alone, that there was so 
much he might have said, that he ought to have 
said, and that he did not say, that he was in de- 
spair. Yet he had been taken unawares, he told 
himself cheeringly, and must forgive himself one 
folly as readily as Candida had forgiven another. 
But he wished it were to-morrow, with all the 


252 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


eagerness of the modest lover who is always going 
to say and do to-morrow the words that he ought 
to have said, and the deeds that he ought to have 
done, to-day. 


CHAPTER XXV. 


IN THE GREENWOOD. 

How horridly relentless man 
Profanes the shrine of sylvan Pan, 

And turns the shepherd’s dancing green 
Into some bloody battle scene ! 

A Pastoral in Pink. 

W HEN Swift set out for his tryst next morn- 
ing, the highway was soft and shining, 
and starred with pools of water. It had 
rained during the night, and rained hard, and the 
ringing roads of yesterday now rivalled quagmires 
in their glutinous tenacity. 

But if the ground was wet below, the sky was 
blue above, and Swift rejoiced in its brightness. 
For he knew very well that Candida always tramped 
abroad, wet or fine, and that unless it rained in 
torrents she would not stay away from the daily 
tryst. Swift was gaitered and shod to defy the mud, 
and he tramped along blithely, swinging his black- 
thorn, and exulting in the clean taste of the morn- 
ing air, that seemed sweeter and purer after its 
bath. There are some mornings when the whole 
253 


254 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


world wears a jubilant air, when every common 
sight and sound carries an unexpected charm and 
yields an unexpected quality of pleasure. 

“ This is the kind of day,” he said to himself, 
“when, if a personable man asked a maid to marry 
him, it might go hard with her to say nay.” And 
then he wondered what Candida would say if he 
made the experiment, and a kind of wild resolve 
to try came into his mind, and stirred his pulses, 
and made his feet step faster with the exquisite ex- 
hilaration that the mere idea brought with it. Swift 
moved so briskly, with that sweet fancy spurring 
him, that he reached the point where he had to turn 
off before he was conscious that he really was so 
near to it. 

As he turned from the road he noted more mark- 
edly in the lane the effects of last night’s rain. A 
little stream trickled in the ditch at either side, and 
the fallen leaves formed a muffled carpet for his 
tread. It was even more noiseless when he turned 
aside into the woods, where the drenched layers of 
the pine-needles yielded thickly to his feet, without 
the familiar crackling sound that he knew and 
liked so well. He was just thinking that, in conse- 
quence of the change, he should not hear Candida 
coming before he saw her, when he suddenly came 
to a stop with a start. From the gentle incline he 
was ascending he could see through the trees the 


IN THE GREENWOOD. 


255 


clearing where he and Candida met, and there was 
some one already waiting in that clearing, and the 
some one was not Candida. The some one was a 
man who was walking slowly up and down. He 
was smoking, and the smoke from his cigar rose 
mistily in the moist air, and its aroma seemed to 
reach faintly to where Swift was. 

Swift drew back, and dropped down into the 
gully from which he had just emerged. He had not 
been seen, he felt sure, and from where he was now 
he could not be seen by the unexpected stranger. 

But he could see the stranger from where he lay ; 
at least, he could catch ftequent glimpses of his 
body as he moved slowly up and down amid the 
trees. The distance between the watcher and the 
watched was too great to allow Swift to distinguish 
the features of the invader ; indeed, had he been 
nearer, he might have failed to do so, for Swift 
could see that he had turned the high collar of his 
coat up about his ears, no doubt as a protection 
against the damp air, but with the result of muffling 
his face very effectually. He was a man of large 
bulk, and he seemed to loom larger through the 
misty woodland air, as he paced up and down upon 
what seemed to be a chosen track, with the mechani- 
cal regularity of a soldier on sentry-go. 

The unwelcomed sentinel moved backwards and 
forwards upon his appointed course several times. 


256 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


and the seconds spun along and grew into minutes, 
and the minutes crept their course persistently, and 
Swift’s agony of impatience and perplexity grew 
and grew. What should he do if this accursed in- 
terloper did not go away, if Candida came while 
he was still keeping his hateful vigil ? How could 
Swift, under the conditions, venture to come forth 
and greet her ? Yet how, on the other hand, could 
he bear to see her and not to speak to her ? Per- 
haps when she came she might send the stranger 
away. Perhaps she might take him away, and then 
return alone. Perhaps she might not come at all. 
Perhaps it might turn out that the invader came to 
that ground with no thought of Candida in his 
mind. 

“ If looks and thoughts could send you flying 
from that place, my friend,” Swift growled to him- 
self, “ you would soon be out of sight.” 

He had scarcely shaped the wish in his mind, if 
not with his lips, when it seemed to be realized. 
At one moment the stranger was clearly visible 
standing out against the lighter air of a space be- 
tween two trees. The next second, to Swift’s ab- 
solute astonishment, he fell straight forward, as a 
tree might fall before a great wind or a great axe, 
and lay stretched at full length on his face on the 
carpet of sodden leaves. The thing happened so 
suddenly and so quickly that Swift still lay motion- 


IN THE GREENWOOD. 257 

less in his retreat, staring stupidly at what had hap- 
pened. 

Then out of the shadow of the trees, out of the 
very ground, as it seemed, a figure rose at a point 
some few yards away from where the body lay, and 
by so much the farther away from where Swift lay 
watching. Just for one second the figure paused, 
and then proceeded to run, still crouching, and 
with something of a bestial quickness, across that 
space between it and the fallen man. In the same 
second Swift had leaped to his feet, and was run- 
ning at his full speed towards the scene of the mys- 
tery. The crouching figure saw him and heard 
him, and stopped for a second in his course, as an 
animal might that was startled in its purpose ; then 
it proceeded to run on again, as an animal might 
that is startled but not to be stayed, ran on in the 
same crouching fashion, only faster than before. 
But the momentary pause had given Swift his 
chance, and he got to where the body lay before 
the other could, and stood in front of it with his 
big blackthorn held well in guard before him. 

The fallen man lay on his face, quite rigid, 
with his hands, that were still by his sides, clutch- 
ing, in their tan-colored gloves, at the dead leaves 
and the tan-colored earth. The cigar that had 
fallen from his mouth lay quite close to his head, 

still alight, and sent up fine spirals of blue smoke, 
17 


258 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


The man’s hat had rolled off, and his short-cut, 
grizzled hair was red with blood. So much Swift 
saw at a glance as he stood on guard : it was 
startling enough and strange enough, but it was 
not so startling and not so strange as the sight 
he saw next. For the crouching creature stopped 
again, then drew itself up to its full height and ad- 
vanced towards Swift. And Swift saw with amaze- 
ment that he was face to face with the man of the 
house of snakes, with the juggler of the Imperial 
Theatre, with Mr. Drass. The man’s outward 
appearance was changed. He was dressed as a 
gipsy might be dressed, or a wandering tinker. 
He had a knife in his hand, and he made no 
attempt to conceal it as he looked at Swift. 
Swift knew at once that the man recognized him ; 
but the man said nothing, but moved slowly for- 
ward, still grasping his knife and gazing steadily 
at Swift. 

“ Go away,” he said quietly, in a low, untroubled 
voice. And he made a slight gesture with his left 
hand, with the hand that did not hold the knife, 
as if he were dismissing some friend after an agree- 
able interview. 

“You scoundrel !” Swift gasped, astonished and 
angry at the man’s composure, “ keep back, or I ’ll 
knock your brains out ! ” 

The man halted, his dark face unchanged, his 


IN THE GREENWOOD. 259 

eyes still riveted upon Swift’s face. Their gaze 
seemed almost to hurt him with its intensity. 

“ Go away,” he said again, with the same mo- 
notonous, even voice of command — “ go away ! 
I have no quarrel with you. You are my guest- 
friend. Go away ; leave me in peace with my 
enemy.” 

Swift’s anger and his irritation at the man’s atti- 
tude broke out. 

“You damned fool ! ” he cried, “do you think 
that I am going to walk away and leave you to 
finish your cowardly job as you please. Keep off, 
or I ’ll kill you ! ” 

The man never moved ; he stood as naturally, 
and almost as stilly, as if he were one of the trees 
that rooted in the damp soil. But he kept his eyes 
all the time fixed upon Swift’s face, and as he 
looked, Swift could feel their influence upon him 
as he had felt it on the night when he had first 
met this man. Across the distance that divided 
them the power of those fixed changeless eyes 
seemed to be asserting itself against him, to be try- 
ing stubbornly, persistently, to dominate his will. 
Swift struggled against the feeling that threatened 
to creep over him — a feeling of intolerable drowsi- 
ness, that strove to muffle and choke his senses. 
He knew that he was still standing in front of the 
victim ; knew that he still held his weapon ready ; 


26 o 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


knew also that he ought to cry for help with all the 
strength of his lungs, but that under the stealing 
influence of his enemy’s eyes he could not com- 
mand himself to utter a cry. This hideous feeling 
lasted for perhaps a second ; it seemed to endure 
for hours, with the man’s voice speaking through 
it all softly. 

What the man said was this, or something like 
it, as well as Swift could understand him in the 
growing unwholesome numbness of his mind and 
body. 

“ My friend,” the man began, and his voice was 
soft and gentle and calm as the voice might be of 
a friend to a friend. “You are unwise to thrust 
yourself into a quarrel that is none of your making. 
Between that man and me there is a blood feud. 
I have a right to his life. He killed my kith and 
kin ; I kill him. It is fair — it is just ; it is the 
will of Heaven. I have waited and watched and 
worked for this hour, and now when my enemy is 
at my mercy you must needs come between us. 
Stand aside, and go your ways in peace : for I 
warn you that, if you force me to it, I will push 
you from my path, not indeed without regret, but 
without hesitation.” 

Swift felt that it was true that those strange eyes 
were influencing him. He had heard that such 
things were possible, that in this way one will is 


IN THE GREENWOOD. 


261 


sometimes compelled to succumb to the power of 
another will. But even in that moment it seemed 
to Swift preposterous that the will of the author of 
The Cry for 'Liberty should have to give way before 
the will of an Asiatic snake-charmer. He resented 
the suggested supremacy, and resisted it with all 
his might, and he felt that he was resisting it with 
success. 

You will do nothing of the kind,” he answered 
now, and as he spoke he rejoiced to find that his 
voice had assumed its strength again. And so re- 
joicing, he resolved to waste no more words upon 
his adversary, but to send his recovered voice ring- 
ing out for aid. Help, help, help ! he shouted, 
and the cry seemed to roll away echoing among the 
encircling pines. 

A flash of fierce light came into the juggler’s 
eyes as he heard those shouts, and saw that his 
power over the Englishman had withered. Swift 
saw this, saw also a flash of fierce light by the jug- 
gler’s right hand, and guessed what was going to 
happen. It almost seemed, he thought afterwards, 
as if the Asiatic, in trying to conquer Swift’s will, 
and in failing to conquer it, had laid his own mind 
in some mysterious way bare to his antagonist. 
For Swift seemed to know by intuition exactly 
what the man was going to do, even before the 
quick brown fingers had given the sudden jerk to 


262 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


the knife. The knife flew through the air as sure 
as an arrow to its aim, which was Swift’s throat. 
But even as the knife quitted the assassin’s hand 
Swift sprang to one side, sprang quick enough and 
far enough to save his life, not quick enough nor 
far enough to avoid the missile altogether. He 
could hear a faint, ripping sound, he could feel a 
stroke across his right shoulder, as if a red-hot 
wire had suddenly fallen across it. The knife fell 
behind him on the grass, leaving a clean cut in its 
track where it had touched him. Startled by the 
pain. Swift dropped his stick. As he did so the 
Indian ran forward, whether with the intention of 
attacking him or of attempting to regain his knife 
Swift never knew. Before he could do either. 
Swift flung himself upon him, and the two men 
closed and gripped each other hard in a mortal 
clasp of hate. 

Swift had thought, so far as the succession of 
events can be said to have allowed him to think 
at all, that as soon as he got his grasp upon his 
adversary his victory would be easy. But the mo- 
ment the men’s arms locked upon each other he 
was startled by the extent of his error. The lean 
brown arms hugged him hard, as if they could and 
would squeeze the breath out of his body ; the 
lean brown leg that was tightly hooked round his 
own seemed almost invincible in its power to drag 
him from the earth. Swift could not, dared not, 


IN THE GREENWOOD. 


263 


cry out for help any more. He needed all his 
strength and all his breath for his own desperate 
struggle for life. As he had pitted his will against 
the Indian’s but a moment before, so now he pitted 
his physical strength, giving back grip for grip, and \ 
straining every nerve to trip and throw his antago- 
nist. For a few seconds the two men stood ex- 
actly where they had met, clasped and rigid. Then 
they began to sway from side to side, and to shift 
their ground little by little as the real contest be- 
gan. Swift guessed that the juggler’s hope would 
' be to bring him to the earth somewhere within 
reach of the fallen knife, and he knew very well 
that if that once happened it would be all up with 
him. So he strove with all his might to drive him 
back, to force him away from the spot. 

The thing was terribly hard to do. The Indian 
clung to him with the tenacity of ivy and the rigid- 
ity of bronze. Swift felt the hot breath of his foe ^ 
upon his face ; he could scarcely breathe himself ; 
he saw dimly the amphitheatre of silent trees, and 
thought with agony of those who might come there 
in a little time and find two dead bodies, and no 
sign of their assassin. The juggler’s grasp seemed 
to grow closer and closer, to squeeze the life out 
of his body as effectively as if he had been caught 
in the coils of one of the great snakes. Then sud- 
denly the juggler seemed to shrink in his grasp, to 
slip his enfolding arms a little lower down around 


264 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

Swift’s body, to expand again, to give a quick up- 
ward jerk, and in a moment Swift found himself 
lifted clear from off his feet. He made a desper- 
ate effort to recover himself, by swinging his weight 
backwards ; then the earth and sky seemed to sway 
around him, and he fell heavily to the ground, with 
his enemy upon the top of him. 

They were still clasped together as they fell. 
Swift was dazed but not stunned by the fall, and 
he clung to his overthrower more furiously than 
ever, lest the lean brown hands should free them- 
selves from behind his back and close upon his 
throat. So they lay there for a little while silent, 
stiffly clenched together. Swift could see the dark 
face of the Indian, could see the dark eyes seeking 
his, and he turned his own away in dread lest the 
snake-charmer might again exert his mysterious 
influence and compel his unnerved arms to unclose 
their clasp. So turning them, he saw something 
that gave him new strength. Candida was stand- 
ing on the edge of the cleared space between the 
two trees. She must have come only that instant, 
for he could see that she had paused in alarm, and 
that her face was full of wonder. Then a great 
hope warmed his heart. 

“ Run ! ” he shouted to her. “ Run to the house 
for help ! Quick, quick ! I can hold out till you 
come.” 


CHAPTER XXVI. 


WELL STRUCK. 

Oh, what a woman is this woman ! rose 
Of all the virtues, queen of all the world. 

The Prince of Padua, 

T O his surprise, Candida did not obey him, as 
he expected confidently that she would do. 
Instead of turning, she ran straight and 
quickly across the soft ground to the place where 
the two men lay. Though the earth was carpeted 
so thickly with the wet leaves and needles that her 
approach was inaudible to Swift, albeit he could see 
her coming, the quick ears of the Indian seemed to 
detect the footfalls, for he struggled anew to regain 
the supremacy that had slipped away from him. 
But Swift, maddened now by his new fear for Can- 
dida, gripped him closer and harder, and so the two 
men lay a silent, motionless mass of tension and of 
hate as the girl ran up to them. 

Candida’s quick glance ran over the scene, saw 
the body that lay with its face down, saw the 
trampled soil, saw the two men at grips together 
265 


266 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


for dear life, saw the long bright knife gleaming 
among the wet leaves. She said nothing, but sprang 
to the place where the knife lay, and caught it up. 
Then she ran back and kneeled beside the strug- 
gling pair, and swung the knife up in her right hand 
over the back of the Indian. Her blue eyes blazed, 
her red lips were parted in passion, and Swift, star- 
ing up at her, thought that she looked like Judith. 

The bright blade remained still in the air for a 
moment, and Swift waited with an odd curiosity 
for it to descend and bury itself in his opponent’s 
body. But it did not descend, for in another mo- 
ment Candida had sprung to her feet again with a 
kind of sob, and Swift could hear the dull thud on 
the ground where the knife fell as it dropped from 
her relaxed fingers. He felt now that he was lost, 
and yet there was a kind of satisfaction at his heart 
to think that the knife did not descend. 

But if Candida dropped the knife she caught up 
another weapon. In another instant she was stand- 
ing erect beside the two men, and Swift saw that 
she held in both her hands his blackthorn stick 
firmly grasped and well poised. He had barely 
time to wonder dully what a girl like Candida could 
do with such a weapon, when his question was an- 
swered. The heavy stick was driven down with 
surprising force and sureness of stroke upon the 
Indian’s head. Swift heard him give a dull groan, 


WELL STRUCK. 


267 


felt him shudder, and relax his grasp, but Candida 
swung the stick and brought it down again and yet 
again with direct aim and effect. Her hands were 
skilful ; her face was fierce with anger. Swift felt 
that his enemy lay limp and senseless in his arms. 

“ Stop, stop ! ” he shouted, as Candida swung the 
stick again. “ That ’s enough. I can manage him 
now.” 

Candida lowered her weapon and drew back a 
step, while Swift easily shook himself free from the 
seemingly lifeless adversary, and rolled him over 
an inanimate mass upon the ground. Then he in 
his turn caught up the knife, and held it firmly as 
he kneeled over the Asiatic. Candida had struck 
so strongly and so straight that for a moment Swift 
fancied that the man might be killed. But the 
man’s heart was still beating, and his breath still 
came and went faintly. 

“ Are you hurt ? ” Candida asked. 

He looked up. She was standing by his side, 
leaning upon the blackthorn as if for support, and 
she was very pale now, and seemed to be trembling, 
and her voice shook a little. 

“Not in the least,” he answered. “I feel a bit 
squeezed and mauled and bruised, that ’s all. But 
there ’s somebody over there who is hurt, and 
badly.” 

“ Oh yes — Colonel Rockielaw,” she said, 


268 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


The name conveyed no idea to Swift. 

“ I am afraid the poor fellow ’s killed,” he said. 
“ He has never moved from the first.” 

By this time Candida was kneeling at the side of 
the fallen man, and was looking at the wound on 
his head. 

“ I don’t think he is dead,” she answered. “ I 
think I had better turn him on his back. I know 
something about accidents.” 

Rockielaw was a heavy man, and he lay a dead 
weight upon the'ground ; but the girl showed that she 
was strong enough to turn him on his back, and skil- 
ful enough to do it with ease and gentleness. He 
looked a grim object, for his face was all smeared 
with earth" and stained with blood, and there were 
dead leaves in his mouth. Candida pulled these 
away at once ; wiped the face cleaner with her 
handkerchief, unfastened his coat and waistcoat, 
and put her hand over his heart. 

“ He is not dead,” she said decidedly ; “ his 
heart is beating steadily. He is a strong man ; it 
would take a great deal to kill him. How did it 
all happen ? ” 

Swift did not, could not, answer immediately. 
He was struck into silence by a new wonder. From 
where he stood he could see the fallen man’s face 
distinctly, and he recognised it, to his amazement, 
as the face of the man with whom he had the alter- 


WELL STRUCK. 


269 


cation on Primrose Hill. His senses reeled, and 
he pressed his hand to his forehead mechanically 
as he asked himself if he were really the victim of 
some illusion. 

Candida, wondering at his silence, looked up 
from where she stooped over Rockielaw’s body, 
and repeated her question. 

“ How did it all happen ? ” 

The sound of her voice restored Swift to equa- 
namity. The whole thing might be explained, 
must be explainable, but he felt that now was not 
the time to ask questions of Candida or even to 
answer her question. 

“ I will tell you another time,” he answered. 
“ Get help now, and at once.” 

As Candida rose, he added : 

“ Can you spare me that scarf you have about 
your neck ?” 

She handed the scarf to him, and her eyes asked 
questions, but she spoke none. Swift understood, 
and answered. 

“ Mind you get another as soon as you get to the 
house,” he said ; “ this I am going to degrade by 
using it to bind the hands of this scoundrel. I 
shall be surer then of controlling him till help 
comes.” 

He rolled the Indian, who showed no signs of 
returning consciousness, over on his face, and pro- 


270 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


ceeded with sufficient dexterity to tie his wrists 
tightly together. Candida seemed inclined to 
stand and watch him, but he bade her go at once 
for help, and in a moment she was running quickly 
through the woods in the direction of The Towers. 

It seemed an age-long time to him that he waited 
there in that ghastly company, but it was really only 
a few minutes before he heard voices among the 
trees, and the sound of footsteps approaching, and 
then Candida came running at full speed across 
the clearing, accompanied by half a dozen men, 
who found it no easy matter to keep pace with her 
rapid motion. The men were servants, mostly 
stable hands, the first that Candida could find. 
At first, on seeing the two fallen men, and Swift 
with the knife in his hand, they were ready to lay 
violent hands upon him for the assassin. And, in- 
deed, Swift, with his haggard face, his soiled and 
torn clothes, and that strange weapon in his grasp, 
looked wild enough to justify some suspicion. 
But Candida, to whom they listened with great at- 
tention, soon undeceived her escort. She ordered 
three of them to take up with great care the body 
of Colonel Rockielaw, who still showed no signs 
of returning consciousness. The others were to 
take charge of the equally senseless Indian, and 
see that he was kept in safe custody until he came 
to himself and could be examined by Sir George, 


WELL STRUCK. 


271 


who was a magistrate and justice of the peace. A 
man had already been despatched to ride for the 
doctor ; another to try and find Sir George him- 
self, who had gone out riding with Mr. Windover. 
So much Candida told Swift while the men obeyed 
her instructions — lifting the inanimate bodies from 
the ground, and carrying them as gently as they 
could away towards The Towers. As the bearers 
and their burdens disappeared amidst the trees, 
Candida, who had remained behind with Swift, 
asked him if he, too, would come to The Towers 
and meet Sir George, and tell his story. 

Swift shook his head. 

I would rather not,” he said, just now. Of 
course there will he aii inquiry into all this, and of 
course I shall be expected to give evidence, and of 
course I shall be ready to do so whenever I am 
called upon. It seems to me that the best thing I 
can do at this moment is to make myself as much 
like a civilized creature again as possible and 
he looked down with a smile at his torn and earth- 
stained clothes. 

Candida laughed. 

Perhaps that will be the best thing,” she said. 
‘‘ But you had better wait at your inn until Sir 
George sends for you. He will begin his examina- 
tion into this adventure the moment he returns. 

Swift promised that he would hold himself in 


272 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


readiness upon Sir George’s will. There was a mo- 
ment’s pause, and the man and woman stood look- 
ing at each other in silence. 

Then Swift held out his hand, and Candida took 
it. 

“ Candida,” he said, “ I owe you my life. Can- 
dida, I love you ! ” 

The girl put a finger of her disengaged hand to 
her lips. 

“ Hush,” she said very softly. “ Not now, not 
here. Your promise. And who knows that you 
may not change your mind before midnight. It is 
only mid-day now.” 

Swift stared at her with such amazement in his 
face that Candida laughed again. Then a look of 
concern came into his eyes as he thought that per- 
haps the recent excitement made her talk a little 
wildly. Candida guessed his apprehension. 

“ Don’t be surprised,” she said. “ And don’t be 
alarmed. I am not at all hysterical, though I laugh 
now who cried a few minutes ago. It is all right. 

‘ Journeys end in lovers meeting, 

Every wise man’s son doth know.’ 

So say good-bye to Candida, and if you choose 
you can say again, ‘ I love you, Candida.’ ” 

“ I love you, Candida,” Swift said very gravely 
and tenderly. Their hands were still clasped, and 


WELL STRUCK. 273 

she pressed his kindly, and her smiling face grew 
grave. Then she let go his hand. 

“ There,” she said, “ I am a strange girl, and I 
am glad to have heard you say that again which 
a moment ago I forbade you to say. Good-bye, 
my friend — good-bye, my lover. If ever we shall 
meet again I know not. If not, why, then this 
parting was well made.” 

She laughed again, and Swift looked at her anx- 
iously, troubled by her mirth. 

“ Forgive me,” she said ; “ I am possessed by a 
spirit of quotation to-day, and talk in the tags of 
another’s thought. ‘ Would it were bed-time, and 
all well ! ’ There, that is the last of them and of 
me. Stay exactly where you are. Do not move, 
do not touch me. Promise.” 

Swift looked obedience, and Candida, coming 
close to him, leaned lightly forward and touched 
her lips to his, as gently as if the petal of a flower 
had fallen against his face. Then, before he had 
time to speak, she turned and ran from him as if 
she were running for her life. He stood where 
she had left him, with her kiss warm upon his 
mouth ; he looked after her in a kind of agony of 
joy and sorrow. It was true that she had kissed 
him. Nothing could undo that. But her words 
had a ring of farewell in them that made his heart 
ache with strange fears. He watched her flying 

x8 


274 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

form disappear among the trees. Then he turned 
with a sigh, and looked around him upon the tram- 
pled space of earth which had been the stage of 
such a succession of strange scenes. 

“ Candida, Candida, Candida ! ” he called aloud. 

But no echo answered his call from the encir- 
cling woods. Then he began to walk as briskly as 
he could in the direction of Bullford. His body 
was stiff and sore from the struggle, and he made 
slow progress. His heart was troubled with doubt 
and delight, and seemed to weigh him down. 


CHAPTER XXVII. 


THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. 

I think the gods 

Conjured the passion of amazement up, 

That in this moment of the world’s career 
Myself should marvel. 

The Prince of Padua, 

A COUPLE of hours later Swift sat in the 
sitting-room at the Blue Boar and medi- 
tated upon the events of the morning. He 
had made his way through the streets of Bullford 
without attracting any undue degree of attention 
from such of its citizens as were abroad upon the 
High Street, or as stood in the doorways of their 
shops and waited languidly upon a languid cus- 
tomer. No doubt the sight of a man in torn garments, 
plentifully bedaubed with earth, provoked some 
comment as Swift passed by as quickly as he 
could. But the noon was hot, and Bullford’s in- 
terest in passing events was at no time very keen, 
not even when a circus perambulated its streets. 
So Swift reached his inn without experiencing any 
obtrusive sense of having the eyes of the world 
upon him. 


275 


276 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Budget, for a wonder, was up and out on some 
election business that was, or seemed to be, press- 
ing, and Swift felt mightily relieved at his ab- 
sence, for he did not want at once to tell him of 
the events of the morning, while yet to meet him 
and keep silence would seem unwarrantably churl- 
ish and reserved towards one’s travelling compan- 
ion and colleague in apolitical campaign. So Swift 
hastened to his own room, changed his clothes, 
took a bath, and respected himself again. 

As he rested now in the cool sitting-room and 
stared into the sunny street, he tried, not very suc- 
cessfully, to piece together the puzzle of the pres- 
ence of Drass at Bullford, and the identity of his 
victim with the man of Primrose Hill, when a car- 
riage and pair came clattering along, and drew up 
sharply at the door of the inn. As the carriage 
carried Sir George Amber’s arms, and as the ser- 
vants wore Sir George Amber’s livery, the attention 
of all lingerers in the street was drawn to the inn 
door. Swift guessed that it came for him. 

“ It ’s bad enough to be mauled about all the 
morning,” he grumbled to himself, “ without having 
to explain about it to a justice of the peace in the 
afternoon.” 

He watched the footman get off the box, with a 
letter in his hand, and he felt as certain as if he 
had seen the superscription that it was addressed 


THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. 


277 


to himself. So when, after a brief delay, there 
came a knock at the sitting-room door, and the 
handmaiden entered with a letter on a tray. Swift 
took it with a feeling of absolute indifference. 
The indifference did not last longer than the mo- 
men-t in which he first held the letter in his hand. 
For though it was indeed addressed to him, it was 
addressed in no sprawling or masculine hand, but 
in a sloping, somewhat old-fashioned, fine hand- 
writing that was obviously feminine. Such a hand- 
writing, Swift felt convinced, could never be Sir 
George Amber’s, and so he paused for a moment 
or two staring at the sloping script, before he de- 
cided that the simplest way to solve the puzzle was 
to open the letter. When he did so, his surprise 
increased. The letter ran thus : 

“ Miss Dorothy Carteret presents her compli- 
ments to Mr. Brander Swift, and would be greatly 
obliged by the favor of a few minutes’ interview 
with him immediately. The carriage that carries 
this letter will bring Mr. Swift to The Towers. 
Miss Carteret trusts that Mr. Swift will excuse a 
request the reasons for which are urgent and im- 
portant.” 

The girl interrupted his perplexity with the ques- 
tion whether he had any answer to send. 


278 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Yes, yes,” he said, “ of course. Please say I 
will be down directly.” 

Then, as the girl left the room with this message, 

. he read the note again, and once more asked him- 
self in amazement what Miss Dorothy Carteret 
could have to say to him, or he to Miss Dorothy 
Carteret, that could call for such a peremptory, 
and even portentous, appointment. Even her in- 
dependence, he reflected, could hardly permit her 
to usurp any of Sir George’s functions as Justice 
of the Peace. Although he was an advanced re- 
former, Swift was not really very clear in his mind 
as to what the precise powers and authorities 
wielded by a Justice of the Peace actually were, 
but at least he felt sure that in no case could any 
of them be legally delegated to Miss Carteret. So 
that suggestion was untenable. 

“ If I were a Sylph,” he thought, “ or even of 
the stuff whereof Sylphs are made, there might be 
some meaning in it ; but as it is, why, I cannot 
even play the penny whistle.” 

But even while his mind was trifling with memo- 
ries of the musical qualifications rumored to be es- 
sential to Sylphdom he felt convinced that the 
proposed interview would prove to have something 
to do with Candida. It was quite possible that 
Miss Carteret had learned of the intimacy between 
him and Candida. It might have been discovered 


THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. 279 

in consequence of the recent struggle. Candida 
might have taken it into her head to tell all about 
it to her patroness, and her patroness in turn might 
very well have taken it into her head to interfere 
in the matter one way or another. Anyhow, it 
seemed to him to be plain that the best thing he 
could do was to obey Miss Carteret’s command, 
and hear what she had to say to him. Whether he 
went to The Towers at her bidding or that of Sir 
George Amber mattered, after all, very little. 

There was quite a little group of people about 
the inn door when Swift made his appearance. 
His person was already familiar to many of the 
Bullford townspeople as the colleague of the ex- 
treme candidate, and those in the knot who knew 
so much felt and expressed no small surprise at 
seeing him enter the carriage of Sir George Amber, 
the champion of the other candidate and of the 
other cause. One local politician expressed his 
conviction that Swift had been nobbled, and was 
about to rat on his old ally ; another, who pro- 
fessed a profounder knowledge of men and things, 
insisted that the incident foreshadowed a compro- 
mise, a Round Table conference, which would 
result in the retirement both of Budget and Win- 
dover, and the substitution of a third candidate, 
who in some inexplicable fashion should manage 
to face all ways and to please all parties. 


280 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Swift was almost unconscious of, and quite in- 
different to, the temporary interest he had aroused. 
As he leaned back in the open carriage and saluted 
the familiar sights of so many morning walks, he 
found that his thoughts ran less upon what Miss 
Carteret might have to say to him, or the account 
that he should give to Sir George of his fight in 
the woods, than on the question whether or no he 
should be lucky enough to get a glimpse of Can- 
dida. He could not help imagining, more from 
the tone of Candida’s voice when she spoke of her 
patroness than from any words she actually ut- 
tered, that Miss Carteret did not treat her^vith any 
great consideration. The thought made Swift furi- 
ous. Candida was the most delightful girl in the 
world, the one fair woman, and he raged to think 
that her beauty and her wit could find her no better 
fate than to play the dependent on a minx of for- 
tune. 

“ If she would only marry me,” he said to him- 
self — “ if she would only marry me ! ” 

He did not reflect, or did not choose to reflect, 
that in considering to share the conditions of his 
somewhat hand-to-mouth existence Candida would 
be gaining no very brilliant substitute for her posi- 
tion as the companion of the amazing Miss Carteret. 
With the divine egotism of youth, he assumed as 
the basis of all his argument that, because he hap- 


THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. 


281 


pened to be in love with Candida, his companion- 
ship must therefore be the best thing in the world 
for Candida. If any one had told him that he rea- 
soned thus, he would have given his informant the 
lie. But he did reason thus, all the same, and for 
the very good reason that he could not help doing so. 

He was so occupied with these reflections that 
he lost heed of the road and his destination. He 
had just made up his mind that if he saw Candida 
that day — or, failing that, the next time he did see 
her — he would make one urgent appeal to her to 
share his want of fortune, when he became aware 
that the carriage was passing through a lodge-gate. 
In a few seconds the carriage drove into an open 
space and came to a stop before the red walls of 
The Towers. 

The moment the carriage had stopped the door 
opened, and when Swift asked for Miss Dorothy 
Carteret, it was plain that he was expected. The 
servant, without asking his name, invited him to 
follow, and led him through the great hall and up 
a wide staircase. 

When they reached the head of the staircase, he 
followed his guide along a gallery hung with por- 
traits of ancestral Ambers at different periods in 
the history of their house. At the end of the gal- 
lery there was another small hall or antechamber 
of circular shape, situated in one of the towers that 


282 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


gave their name to the building, and commanding 
through several windows views of the lovely Surrey 
landscape. 

As he passed, Swift glanced through at the 
wooded hills that sloped away below him, and 
sought to distinguish amid the green darkness of 
the pines the locality of the spot where, but a few 
hours before, he had been making so fierce a strug- 
gle for so great a stake. But though he could guess 
pretty shrewdly where the place lay, the trees seen at 
that distance stood too close together to allow him 
to be sure. The clearing that had made so large 
an arena that morning for his struggle was not, it 
seemed, large enough to mark any gap in the ranks 
of the forest. The trees kept the secret, and Swift 
thought with a kind of shudder that some one might 
have been sitting in that very room that very morn- 
ing, looking over the scene with listless eyes, all 
unaware of the savage battle that was raging be- 
neath one corner of that spreading cloak of verd- 
ure. If help had not come. Swift thought, if the 
assassin had overcome him and had glided away 
in safety, leaving two victims behind him, how long 
might the bodies have lain there, beneath the very 
windows of The Towers, as it were, before any one — 
somegamekeeper or some tramp — found them? Swift 
seemed to realize for the first time the reality of the 
peril through which he had been permitted to pass. 


THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. 283 

The servant went to a door at the other side of 
the turret-room, opened it, and announced Swift. 
Swift passed in, and the door closed behind him. 
For a moment he thought that he was alone — but 
only for a moment. There was a woman in the 
room, seated in the recess of a window, a recess 
that was cushioned like a divan. As Swift entered 
the woman rose and advanced to meet him. Swift 
found himself face to face with Candida. 

Surprise and delight made him speak. 

Candida ! ” he cried. “ I did not expect — I 
dared not hope to see you.” 

Even in the flush of his joy he noted that her 
face was joyless, that her eyes were unquiet with 
an anxiety new to him, that her lips trembled as 
if she were in pain. 

I suppose not,” she said, and her voice sounded 
appealingly, with a sorrowfulness that amazed him. 
“ But it seems to give you pleasure.” 

The tone of her voice, the look of her face, were 
too insistent to be ignored, but they left Swift help- 
less to interpret them or to appreciate the question 
implied in her speech. 

“How could it help giving me pleasure,” he said 
— “ unexpected pleasure ? I was summoned here 
by Miss Carteret, and I have the good fortune to 
see you first. Perhaps you can tell me why she 
wants to see me.” 


284 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Candida drew back a couple of steps, but she 
still looked him full in the face, though she put her 
hand for a moment to her forehead nervously, al- 
most as if she were mechanically warding off a blow. 
Swift felt suddenly anxious at the sight of her anxi- 
ety, and moved a little nearer to her. She drew 
back again. 

“ I am afraid you do not understand,” she said. 
“ I am sure you do not understand.” 

A queer feeling of fear, chilling and inexplica- 
ble, crept over Swift’s senses. What could trouble 
Candida so much ? What was it that he did not 
understand ? 

“ What is the matter ? ” he asked eagerly. “ Are 
you ill ? Has anything happened ? ” 

The girl shook her head ; her eyes still watched 
Swift’s face with feverish intensity. 

“ I am all right,” she answered ; “ and nothing 
has happened.” Her voice fell away, and she 
added in a whisper, so faint that Swift barely 
caught the meaning of her words, “ Nothing as 
yet.” 

“ I do not understand ? ” Swift questioned. ‘‘ What 
is it that I do not understand ? ” 

He was excited now, touched by vague terrors, 
made nervous by her nervousness, troubled by those 
nameless apprehensions that tempt a strong man to 
scream, He moved nearer to her, and again, she 


THE LADY OF THE HOUSE. 


285 


drew back, and this time she held out her hand as 
if to keep him away from her, while the trouble in 
her face deepened. 

“ Do you know who I am ? ” she asked almost 
fiercely ; and before Swift had time to grasp the 
meaning of her question, she added hurriedly, “ I 
am Dorothy Carteret.” 

Then she let both her hands fall to her sides, and 
stood still and silent before him. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 


THE RIDDLE READ. 

If I deceived you, 

Pray you forgive ; 

If I have grieved you, 

Live and let live ; 

Now for my hopes and fears. 

Foolish or wise, 

Do you not see that tears 
Trouble my eyes ? 

Now all my perils past. 

All my alarms. 

Let me feel safe at last. 

Love, in your arms. 

Rhymes for Remembrance, 

T hough Swift heard the words, he did not 
for an instant understand their significance. 
He knew that he was in the presence of 
Candida ; he did not know why she should say that 
she was any one but Candida. He tried to ask her 
what she meant ; he rather looked than spoke the 
question, which she answered in the same words : 

“ I am Dorothy Carteret.” 

This time Swift understood her ; knew that she 
was in earnest, knew that she was speaking a strange 
286 


THE RIDDLE READ. 28/ 

truth, and the knowledge hurt him and amazed him 
as much as if she had struck him in the face. 

“ My God ! ” he groaned, and then, though he 
felt the hopeless futility of his question, he asked, 
“ Is this true ? ” 

“ Quite true,” the girl answered sadly. 

She was very pale, and she looked at him appeal- 
ingly. 

Swift moved over to the fireplace and leaned 
against the chimney-piece. He felt that he wanted 
support, that the world was reeling around him, 
that he might faint. The news seemed to stun him. 
He was stupefied by this sudden transformation of 
his recent life, and of the love that had been so in- 
expressibly dear to him. All the joy of his devo- 
tion to Candida seemed to be blotted out of his past ; 
it was not Candida he had served, but another ; he 
had worshipped a shadow like the fool in the fable. 
What did it all mean ? Why had Candida, she who 
was no longer Candida, played this cruel trick ? 
He had rested his head wearily upon his hand while 
he tried to think his troubled thoughts out, but 
they were all tangled and bewildering. He lifted 
his head and looked reproachfully at the girl, who 
was standing still and looking at him. 

“ Why did you do this ? ” he asked painfully ; “ I 
believed in you.” 

The girl came close up to him and put her hand 


288 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


for a moment on his arm very softly. In her look, 
in her action, in the sound of her voice, there was 
a timidity most foreign to her, a timidity that, as 
Swift realized afterwards, was unspeakably touching. 

“ I am very sorry,” she said — “ very, very sorry. 
I want you to forgive me, dear.” 

She had never spoken so tenderly to him before, 
and the very sweetness of her address seemed to 
his aching heart to make the bitter business yet 
more bitter. 

He was still too surprised and too angry to be 
soothed by her gentleness. He felt that he had 
been fooled, mocked, and for no apparent purpose. 
So it was with a harsh voice and a harsh look that 
he replied to her appeal. 

I do not think that you need my forgiveness,” 
he said. “ You were free to do as you please, and 
it pleased you to deceive me, to delude me, to 
break my heart. God knows why you have done 
this thing.” 

“ You have every right to be angry with me,” 
she answered quietly, still keeping near to him. 
“ What I did was very wrong, very foolish, very 
wicked, if you like. But I hope and believe, for 
my sake and for your sake, that you will find it in 
your heart to pardon Dorothy Carteret for the de- 
ceit of Candida Knox. Why should your heart be 
harder to me now than it was this morning ? Is 


THE RIDDLE READ. 289 

the name Dorothy less pleasant for a lover’s lips 
to utter than the name of Candida ?” 

“Why do you mock me,” he asked. “What 
have you and I got to do with love now ? I loved 
a girl who was poor, a girl in my way of life, a girl 
whom I could ask to be my wife. And that girl is 
gone and dead, is worse than dead, for she never 
lived at all ; she was only a shadow, a cheat, a lie ! 
she was but the mask that it amused a woman of 
the world to wear for a whim ! Oh, Candida, Can- 
dida, I loved you, loved you ! ” 

He turned away again, for he felt the tears com- 
ing into his eyes, and he was ashamed of his passion 
and afraid of his sorrow. The girl’s pale face red- 
dened a little at the display of his wild anger and 
grief. 

“ I wish you would call me Dorothy,” she said 
entreatingly. “ I want you to call me Dorothy, 
and to think of me as Dorothy ” — her voice wa- 
vered for a moment, and then she went on firmly 
and rapidly — “ and, if you can, to love me as 
Dorothy.” 

He gave a groan, and shook his head without 
looking at her. He had covered his face with his 
hands, as if he hoped to force back his tears. 

“ I cannot help loving you,” he muttered. 
“ That is not to be prayed for. But it is all so 

different.” 

19 


290 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


She put her hand upon his shoulder, as if she 
hoped by her touch to make him lift his head and 
look at her. 

“ It is different,” she said; “ and different most of 
all in one way. Listen to me, dear, for there is some- 
thing I must needs tell you. Candida Knox liked 
you, liked you very much ; but Dorothy Carteret 
loves you, which is more than Candida ever did.” 

He drew away his hands from his face, and 
looked eagerly at her. His face was white, and he 
looked haggard. 

What do you mean?” he asked. “Do you 
mean what you say ? But what is the good ? You 
are out of my star.” 

“ My dear,” she answered with the nearest ap- 
proach to a smile that her face had worn since the 
interview began — “ my dear, don’t talk nonsense. 
You should be above such prejudices and conven- 
tionalities. You will find no defence of them. I 
> * 

am very sure, in the Cry for Liberty'' 

Swift muttered something to himself which 
sounded very like an imprecation upon the Cry for 
Liberty. 

“ Don’t abuse the Cry for Liberty f Dorothy Car- 
teret said composedly. “ I assure you I am very 
grateful to it. There is a lot that ’s wrong in it, 
and a lot that ’s wrong-headed, but it is a brave 
book by a brave man — by the man I love.” 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


291 


Her voice, which had begun lightly, sounded so 
tender a note as she said the last few words, that it 
seemed to pierce through all his pride and all his 
anger, and touch the core of his being. She saw 
the softened look in his face, and her eyes bright- 
ened. 

“ If Candida Knox would never let you make 
love to her,” she said, “ you must forgive Dorothy 
Carteret if she makes love to you. For she does 
love you, and she does not mean to lose you be- 
cause of a few prejudices and conventionalities 
which we both despise, or because you feel angry 
at being the victim of a foolish jest that was, after 
all, a very happy reality.” 

It was impossible to doubt the sincerity of her 
speech, the earnestness of her appeal — impossible 
to listen to her, and not be touched and softened. 
All the bitterness seemed to melt away from Swift’s 
sorrow ; only the ache of regret remained, not the 
sting of anger. 

“ I was very happy,” he said in a low voice ; “ I 
was very happy. But I am a poor devil and a 
democrat — a man of the people ; and you are a 
daughter of the opposite camp, a great lady, a wo- 
man of fortune. What common life is there for us 
who come from opposite poles. What can there 
be in common between the Mountain and La 
Vendee ? 


292 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


Somehow this illustration from the French 
Revolution with which Swift closed his little speech 
did not ring very truly in his ears as he uttered it. 
After all, was he a man of the Mountain, and was 
there anything about the position of Dorothy Car- 
teret that recalled the Vendean tradition. He felt 
even as he spoke that she would detect its cheap- 
ness, and disdain his little rhetorical sentence. But 
there was no show of malice in her eyes or mouth 
as she listened. 

“We are talking seriously,” she said. “ This is 
a serious moment in both our lives. Suppose we 
sit down and take it seriously.” 

She moved back to the window-seat where she 
had been sitting when Swift entered the room, and 
motioned to Swift to follow her example. He sat 
by her side and looked into her face. Below them 
the hills and woods smiled in the sunlight. 

“To begin with,” said Dorothy, speaking with 
the sweet imperiousness that he had always thought 
sat so divinely upon Candida — “ to begin with, let 
us leave the French Revolution out of the jest. 
We really are not at all like people in the French 
Revolution, and it is no use our playing that we 
are.” 

“ There is a relative resemblance,” said Swift, 
but Dorothy immediately interrupted him. 

“ No, there is n’t,” she said ; “ for even if I were 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


293 


to admit, which I don’t, that you are drowned in 
the doctrines of the Cordeliers’ Club, I must, speak- 
ing for myself, deny that I am a devotee, for ex- 
ample, of the divine right of kings. One of my 
ancestors went to the scaffold as a protest against \ 
that doctrine.” 

“ There you are,” said Swift, “ that ’s it. You 
have ancestors : I haven’t.” 

Dorothy frowned reprovingly. Perhaps she felt 
that she would find no great difficulty in winning 
back the ascendency of Candida. 

“ You can’t help yourself,” she answered. “ And 
if you could, if you sprang straight from the soil, 
ruddy with the red earth of Adam, it would not 
alter my thoughts of you, it ought not to alter your 
thoughts of me. It is what we think of each other 
that matters, not what any one else may think of 
us. You must admit so much. It is one of the 
fundamental doctrines of the Cry for Liberty^ 

Swift nodded his head. The whole situation 
seemed so unreal, so fantastic, that he began to 
think that he could not do better than leave it to 
Dorothy to manage in her own way. 

“Very well,” the girl went on ; “let us settle 
what we do think about each other. Do you love 
me ? ” 

“ I love you with all my heart and soul,” Swift 
answered passionately. The formula was conven- 


294 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

tional, but it expressed strongly the greatest truth 
he knew. 

“ And I love you,” she said simply. “ You 
wanted to marry Candida Knox. Will you decline 
to marry Dorothy Carteret, who is forward enough 
to offer herself ? ” 

“ But you are rich and I am poor,” Swift said 
sadly ; “ and people would say, people would think 


Dorothy coolly interrupted him. 

“ Which is of most importance to you ? ” she 
asked — “ what people say and think, or what I say 
and think ? ” 

“ Why, what you say and think, of course,” he 
answered. He felt that he was drifting out of his 
depth, and that he was glad to drift. The differ- 
ence between Candida Knox and Dorothy Carteret 
was growing fainter and fainter every moment. 

“ Very well,” said the girl. “ I say and think that 
the love you had for Candida pledges you to love 
Dorothy no less dearly, provided, of course, that 
you can forgive her for her fraud.” 

“ Ah, yes ; why did you do that ? ” he asked. He 
had forgotten that she had given him no reason for 
that amazing masquerade. 

“To speak by the card,” Dorothy replied, “ lest 
equivocation should undo me, I must say that I did 
it because I liked. I am rather a terrible young 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


295 


woman. I have done as I liked all my life, and I 
always had a passion for adventures. Haroun al 
Rashid was ever one of my ideals.” 

“ I don’t think that I quite understand,” Swift 
said. In his heart he began to feel conscious that 
it did n’t matter what he understood so long as he 
was near to Dorothy. He was becoming quite rec- 
onciled to the metamorphosis. 

“ You will understand me better when you know 
me better,” Dorothy said. “ I was always of Em- 
erson’s mind, when he said that he would make 
whim the law of his life, that he would write the 
word over his doorway. I have done all manner 
of mad things ever since I was a bit of a child, 
just because I wanted to learn what it would feel 
like to do them, and how I should like doing them. 
Do you understand the mood at all ? ” 

‘‘ Yes, perhaps I do,” Swift answered doubtfully. 
He began to believe that he was more common- 
place than he had imagined himself to be, and the 
belief was not, at the moment, a joy. 

Well,” Dorothy went on, “ I have always had 
my own way. We come of a wild blood ; and I 
dare say that, if I had been a man and lived in the 
last century, I should have been as bad as any of 
my people. As it was, my wildness took other 
forms. There are a great many mad stories set 
down to my account which are not at all true. I 


296 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

must confess that there are some mad stories which 
are true, but the maddest of them all, I assure you, 
is the adventure of Candida Knox.” 

Swift felt very like a man in a dream as he sat 
there in the wide window-seat and looked at Doro- 
thy’s lovely face and listened to her fantastic con- 
fession. But he did n’t say anything, because he 
hadn’t anything to say, and after a brief pause the 
girl went on with her story. 

“ I do not know,” she said, “ that it is the best 
thing in the world for a young woman to come of 
a wild race, and to have plenty of money and 
plenty of admirers, and to be able to do as she 
likes, and to like a reputation for eccentricity and 
unconventionality, for daring and defiance. I do 
not know. Perhaps you will be able to teach me 
later on. Anyhow, that is what I was, that is what 
I am, that is what I am not going to be any 
more.” 

She held out her hand to Swift with the most 
gracious air of self-surrender. Swift clasped it for 
a moment and kissed it. 

“ Do you think one can change one’s nature,” 
he murmured, “ even if one would or should ? ” 

“ One can try,” Dorothy said decisively ; “ and 
I mean to, if you will help me. But even the most 
reckless independence, the most riotous self- 
assertion, may pall at last. About a year ago I 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


297 


got desperately sick of my life, sick of my 
experiments and excitements, sick most of all of 
the Sylphs.” 

“ Ah yes, the Sylphs,” Swift said. “ Then, they 
really do exist — and you founded them, did you 
not?” 

Fragments of those conversations with Windover 
and others, in which the Sylphs had been spoken 
of, came floating vaguely into his mind. 

“Yes, they do exist,” Dorothy said. “And I 
did found them ; but I got tired of them, as I got 
tired of everything else. Sacrifice at the altar of 
the eternal Paradox becomes a bore in the end, 
even if one has set the worship going, and is one’s 
own high-priestess. After we had all decided that 
we were all superior to everybody and everything, 
we seemed to me to be just as commonplace as a 
spelling-bee. And I hated to be commonplace. 
And just then I read the Cry for Liberty. 

“ The Cry for Liberty ! ” Swift said in surprise. 

That great work seemed to be always confront- 
ing him. 

“ Yes, the Cry for Liberty. I heard about it, 
saw it attacked in some paper, and expressed the 
wish to read it. Colonel Rockielaw got it for me, 
If you owe him anything for that, you have helped 
to pay your debt.” 

Swift looked more surprised. He had quite for- 


2gS 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


gotten the name of his fellow-victim in the morn- 
ing’s adventure. 

“ The man whose life you saved this morning — 
for you have saved his life, you will be glad to 
hear, and he shall thank you himself later. Poor 
fellow ! ” 

Dorothy lent the least suggestion of a sigh to 
her utterance of the last two words, and Swift won- 
dered why. But he declared that he was very 
glad indeed to hear of Rockielaw’s safety. He 
did not ask then any questions about Rockielaw. 
Dorothy went on with her narrative. 

“ Well, I read the Crj/ for Liberty — read it a good 
many times. I won’t say that I liked it all, for I 
did n’t, but it all interested me very much. You 
seemed to have strength and purpose and earnest- 
ness, and to believe in all manner of ideals that I 
had somehow or other grown to regard as anti- 
quated, as antiquated as the Greek gods. It was 
all so fresh to me, and I was attracted even by its 
very foolishness — for much of it did seem to me to 
be very foolish.” 

“ I am not surprised at that,” Swift murmured 
apologetically. “Much of it seems very foolish to 
me now.” 

“ Yes ; but it was foolish with the folly of youth, 
with the folly of youth that hopes and believes and 
struggles, and thinks that it is born to set the world 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


299 


right, and is very pleased at the opportunity and 
proud of the adventure. And so the book made 
me curious to see the man ; and I asked about you, 
and learned much about you, and I got some friends 
to take me to some place in the East End where 
you were, and where you made a speech — on the 
sanctity of self-assertion, I think it was. Do you 
remember the speech ? It was not very long ago, 
just before you made the acquaintance of that self- 
assertive young woman, Candida Knox.” 

Swift remembered the speech and the time very 
well indeed. It was at St. Ethelfreda’s Without, 
in the lecture-hall of that People’s Palace which 
had been built by the munificence of the man who 
had dazzled London as the millionaire Luck Bris- 
bane, and who afterwards confessed himself to be 
the fraudulent Luke Beeching. The Vicar of St. 
Ethelfreda’s Without encouraged to some degree 
the expression of extreme opinions, and Swift’s 
discourse had been one of a series of lectures de- 
livered by different thinkers of more or less pub- 
licity on “ The Attitude to Life.” 

It had pleased Swift, working onwards from some 
words of Emerson’s, to make a paradoxical defence 
of the ethics of self-assertion, and this was the lec- 
ture to which Dorothy Carteret had listened. He 
thought of it now with some compunction, for it 
did not seem quite as brilliant in the recollection 


300 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


as in his heart he had thought it in the utter- 
ance. 

“ I am afraid you cannot have been much im- 
pressed,” he murmured — “ or, at least, not very 
happily impressed.” 

“ Indeed, I was very much interested,” Dorothy 
answered decisively. “ The thing was fresh and 
daring, and different from everything that every- 
body else had been saying for the last half century ; 
and if some of it was absurd, much of it was hon- 
est, and all of it was brave. And it brought about 
our friendship.” 

“ Then it was worth the saying,” Swift observed. 
“ I did not dream that I owed it so much.” 

“ Don’t you remember,” Dorothy resumed, “that 
you said that most of us made our lives too meagre, 
that we drifted on from day to day, doing the same 
dull things in the same dull fashion, when we might 
be splendidly busy in experiment, living half a 
dozen lives instead of one ? Do you remember ? ” 

Swift nodded. He did remember, and he began 
to see the result of words spoken with no large ex- 
pectation that they would ever be acted upon. 

“You said that it would be a wise thing, and a 
sane thing, and a brave and beautiful thing, for 
anyone, man or woman, who was hampered by the 
narrowness of a formal way, the circumscription of 
a relentless routine, to find, or try to find, freedom 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


301 


in the attempt to live quite a different life in quite 
a different fashion. It only wanted courage, you 
said — courage and intelligence ; the intelligence to 
decide what different kind of life you would and 
could, under all the conditions, live, and the cour- 
age to carry out the fantastic adventure. When you 
said that, I resolved that I would have the courage 
to carry out the fantastic adventure.” 

“ How little did I dream,” said Swift, “ that what 
I was suggesting then, more as a kind of taunt to 
myself for my own inert acceptance of monotony 
than as sober counsel for others, would find such 
a disciple and lead to such a result ! ” 

The Vicar of St. Ethelfreda’s told me a good 
deal about you and your way of life, and all that 
he told me fanned my curiosity. Of course I could 
have got to know you easily enough then or later, 
but you would not have cared for Dorothy Carteret, 
and I should not have cared for you as you would 
have been sure to show yourself to Dorothy Car- 
teret. And I wanted to try the theory of self- 
assertion. I was sick to death of the Sylphs, 
and Society, and the House of Commons, and 
the way of my world, so I took my plunge into 
the waters of London, disappeared as Dorothy 
Carteret, and came to the surface as Candida 
Knox.” 

“ But how did you manage it ? ” Swift asked. 


302 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


“ Was n’t it very difficult to get away from your 
surroundings like that ? ” 

Dorothy laughed. 

“Not a bit difficult ; at least, not for me,” she 
answered. “ People were so used to my doing just 
what I liked, that if I had said I was going away 
for a walking tour in Japan, nobody who knew me 
would have been in the least surprised. But I 
did n’t say that. I simply said that I was tired of 
town, and was going to rest and read Schopenhauer 
in the country. Instead of resting and reading 
Schopenhauer in the country, I took chambers in 
Bloomsbury and read Brander Swift.” 

Swift slightly reddened. The adventure was 
after his own heart, certainly after his own counsel. 
It was not uncomplimentary to him in its inception, 
and its execution had made him rarely happy. But 
he could not help a faint feeling that he had been 
rather easily duped. Possibly Dorothy guessed 
something of his thought, and strove to soothe it 
in her next speech. 

“ I suppose that it was wrong of me,” she went on. 
“ But I did n’t think of that ; I never do — or, 
rather, I never did — when any enterprise fires my 
fancy. And I really wanted to know you, and 
to know you as a friend, as a comrade, could know 
you. That word ‘ comrade ’ was a great word of 
yours, and I wanted to experiment in comradeship.” 


THE RIDDLE READ. 


303 


** I am glad the experiment did not disappoint 
you,” Swift said, “ It might have, you know.” 

“ If it had, Candida Knox could easily have 
ceased to be,” Dorothy observed demurely. 

“Taking with her the heart of the poor devil 
who had fallen in love with her.” 

Swift’s comment upon Dorothy’s suggestion was 
spoken rather sternly, and once again Dorothy 
seemed to make amends. 

“ I did not think of that when I entered on my 
escapade,” she confessed. “ Of course, people had 
fallen in love with me, or thought they had, and 
told me so in one foolish form of words or another, 
often enough in my weary world. But they always 
either amazed me or amused me, and invariably 
annoyed me. I never thought that you might fall 
in love with me ; I never thought that I might fall 
in love with you.” 

Though she spoke very quietly and composedly, 
her cheeks took a livelier color as she uttered the 
last words. Swift only said, “ My dear ! ” But 
there W'as nothing better or wiser to say, for it 
meant everything. Dorothy spoke a little quicker 
as she went on with her story : 

“ I w^anted my meeting with you — for I was de- 
termined to meet you — to seem to come about quite 
by chance. I had heard from the people at St. 
Ethelfreda’s that you haunted the British Museum 


304 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


a good deal, so I haunted the Museum, too, and 
we met, as it was inevitable that we should meet 
in time, and I saw that you saw me, and that you 
were — what shall I say ? — not displeased with me, 
and like the forward young woman I was and am, 
I took advantage of the situation. You know all 
the rest. Dorothy Carteret begs your pardon with 
all her heart for any deception practised by Can- 
dida Knox. Say that you forgive her.” 

“ There is nothing to forgive,” Swift stammered. 

All his anger, all his wonder, had vanished from 
him, leaving only the certainty of his love for the 
beautiful, appealing woman. 

“Yes, there is,” Dorothy said gravely, and even 
a little sadly. “ It was n’t the right thing to do. 
Let me seek to make amends by always trying to 
do the right thing in future. Help me, now and 
always, to find out what is the right thing to do ; 
help me with my life, my friend, my comrade, iny 
lover.” 

There was a moment’s silence. The room, the 
whole world, seemed to have grown very still. 
Then their eyes met, and he took her in his arms 
and kissed her. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 


TWO LETTERS. 

The years drive by, 

And all things turn to dust : adventure, youth. 

Courage and love — but love the last of all. 

The love of man for woman that endures 
\\'hen other passions have grown old and cold. 

And lends a show of immortality 
To the mortal pageant. 

The Wizard's Wonders. 

G abriel OLDACRE sat in his shaded room 
at Therapia and looked out upon the sunlit 
Bosphorus. The beauty of the scene had 
offered him a kind of consolation many and many a 
time in the days of his exile. In the ceaseless ani- 
mation of that enchanted waterway he had found 
relief from the ache at his heart and the irony of 
his memories. But just now he scarcely heeded 
the picture he beheld. His thoughts 'were busy 
with, the contents of two letters that he had just 
been reading, both of which came from a corner 
of the world that he knew so well. Instead of the 
smiling flood and the smiling shores which now 
were the familiars of his life, his mind’s eye saw 


20 


305 


3o6 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


the Surrey hills and commons, and the lifted lances 
of the army of the pines. Both the letters he had 
been reading came from Pine Hill ; both were 
written from The Towers. One had been ad- 
dressed to Amber Pasha ; the other was directed 
to Gabriel himself. Amber Pasha had asked Ga- 
briel to read the first letter, and Gabriel knew very 
well why. Gabriel’s own letter came from Win- 
dover. Both letters spoke of the same set of events 
from somewhat different points of view. They sup- 
plemented each other in serving to complete a story 
which had first made Gabriel smile, and which now 
made Gabriel sigh. He took up again the first 
letter, the letter to Amber Pasha, the letter from 
Colonel Rockielaw, and read slowly over again the 
passage which had most attracted him. 

“ And so, my dear old friend, another dream has 
come to an end, and another fool has been* made 
the sport of his folly. Fifty-three is a very good 
^ge, a very excellent age. A man whose business 
it is to kill, or be killed, may have as good a time 
at fifty-three as at twenty-three or at thirty-three — 
which is his age, confound him ! No, I .don’t 
mean confound him ; God bless him, with all my 
heart, if she cares for him ; but he has the pull of 
me by twenty years, and I was an ass to think that 
she could ever care for an old fellow of fifty-three. 


TWO LETTERS. 


307 


Well, God bless her wherever she goes, and God 
bless him for her sake, though it ’s no use lying to 
you. Jack, and pretending that I don’t mind an 
atom, or that I think the best man always wins. I 
suppose he is a decent chap enough, though he is 
not the sort of chap I should like a daughter of 
mine to marry ; and, of course, he saved my life 
and all that, and I wish to heaven he had n’t ; 
and, by Jove ! he owed me a bad turn for a row 
we had once when I did n’t know who the devil he 
was. When he sat by my bed and said civil things 
to me, I gave it to him straight. I couldn’t help 
it — I couldn’t help it. I told him I envied him 
his luck ; I told him I wished he had let that 
damned Thuggee devil make an end of me, and 
wipe me out as my father had wiped out his rela- 
tive. And then he spoke like a man, and for the 
moment I liked him, though I hope I shall never 
see him again, for he said some honest words, and 
had the sense to cut them short. I believe he ’s 
a white man, but. Jack, old friend, I did love her 
so, and I did make such a fool of myself. Well, 
it ’s all over and done with — all that business, I 
mean. Life has still some stuff in it for a soldier 
on the right side of sixty, even if he can’t win the 
girl of his elderly heart. I can eat, drink, and be 
merry ; if I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, 
as St. John says, I can fight them again, and I 


308 a woman of impulse. 

hear of a chance of a shindy Soudan-wards, which 
makes the war-horse neigh, my boy. As that fel- 
low did save my life, I ’ll make some use of it for 
the dear old widow, if I can ; better wear out than 
rust out, as Wordsworth or somebody says. God 
and my Queen, since it can’t be God and my 
Lady, Jack. Good-bye. If chance brings me 
anywhere near to Constantinople, we will have a 
good time together — but we won’t talk of this 
trouble any more. That ’s all.” 

Gabriel laid the letter down, and again lifted his 
face and looked through the open window at the 
sunlit Bosphorus. 

“ If a man must come to grief like that,” he 
thought, “ is it better to bear the blow in youth or 
in age ? ” 

The problem disconcerted him. The soldier of 
fifty-three seemed to take his hurt so much better, 
so much more bravely, than the student who was 
younger by nearly a quarter of a century. Ga- 
briel gave a sigh, and then, to help him to dismiss 
his sad thoughts, he took up again the other letter, 
the letter from Windover. It was a long letter, 
written in Windover’s neat, fine handwriting, which 
always gave to what he wrote, even to his copy for 
the journals, a choiceness and distinction that 
savored of the days when a manuscript was under 
obligation to assert itself as a work of art. 


TWO LETTERS. 


309 


My dear Gabriel,” it began, 

“ The curtain is soon to rise upon a new 
scene in that whimsical Comedy of Masks in which 
it amused Miss Carteret, and amazed my poor 
Swift, to play a part. They are to be married in 
a week, and, to everybody’s satisfaction, they have 
agreed to be married in the little church here, 
though both man and woman absolutely insist that 
the ceremony is to be absolutely quiet, and that no 
human being, or almost no human being, is to be 
present at it. Dorothy has got a special license — 
the Archbishop always was devoted to her, and he 
deplores the marriage. I think Sir Charles was 
rather afraid that they would refuse any ceremony 
more sacramental than registration, and I am told 
that Godolphin expressed his surprise that so ec- 
centric a couple consented to the convention of 
any ceremony at all. A nice man, Godolphin — a 
very nice man. 

“ They are going to wander all over the world 
together for a year or so, and you will find them 
knocking at your doors soon enough. You will 
like them. The woman is a wonder ; she is one 
of -the most beautiful women I have ever seen. 
For many reasons I will not say the most beauti- 
ful. She is clever, generous ; she has a quality 
which, for want of a better word, I must needs call 
manly — the quality which Rosalind had, and which 


310 


A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 


carried her to Arden Wood. Yes, she is a rare 
and delightful creature, and I should, no doubt, 
like all the others, be madly in love with her, if 
I had not the good fortune to lose my heart well 
and wisely for good and all. As for Swift, I have 
liked him — I may even say loved him — this many 
a day. He is high-minded, honorable, impulsive. 
If he be quixotic, he is very much in earnest, 
which is something in the days that pass, 
though his earnestness is not always of the same 
quality or directed towards a constant goal. I 
used the word ‘ manly ’ a moment ago in connec- 
tion with Miss Carteret ; I am tempted to apply 
the phrase ‘ womanly ’ to something in Swift’s 
character. 

“ To be a big and bearded man, to preach revo- 
lution and profess respect for the red flag, and yet 
to be, as it were, womanly, to have, that is, much 
of a woman’s waywardness and all a woman’s plen- 
tiful lack of logic, gives a charm to a character al- 
most proportionate to the strength which it steals 
away. However, you will see him ; you will judge 
for yourself ; I may dare to predict that you will 
like him ; I, as I said, love him. He and she, 
these two strange creatures, may make a good 
match of it, may help each other more even by 
their differences than by their resemblances. Any- 
way, they face the world with a brave temper, they 


TWO LETTERS. 


311 

are a good and a gallant couple ; I wish them all 
imaginable joy. 

“ Our Indian friend who tried to assassinate 
Colonel Rockielaw has relieved us of trouble, and 
lightened the load of the world’s scoundreldom 
by quietly killing himself. He was a snake- 
charmer, and he carried a cobra fang about with 
him, and when he saw that his game was up, he 
pricked himself with it in the palm of his hand, 
and so died. I called him a scoundrel, and yet 
I feel as if I ought to retract the term. In carry- 
ing out his queer vendetta he thought that he was 
doing his duty, and was admirable in his perverted 
way. His kinsman had been killed in the Mutiny 
by order of Rockielaw’s father. He had died 
transmitting his legacy of revenge on the man he 
called his murderer to all his brethren. The leg- 
acy came at last to this poor devil, who, curiously 
enough, owed his education and well-being to the 
English rule. But he thought the call was the 
voice of Heaven, and it seems that with infinite 
pains he made his way to England as a snake- 
charmer, and proceeded to stalk his quarry. He 
told us himself that he could have taken Rockie- 
law’s life time and again, but for his superstitious 
desire that the deed of vengeance should take place 
on the anniversary of the execution it avenged. 
He passed day after day in Richmond Park watch- 


A woman of impulse. 


31^ 

ing Rockielaw’s house, and gloating over the 
thought that the victim was ignorant of the fate 
which every day brought a little nearer. 

“ When Rockielaw came down here to Amber’s, 
the fellow followed him, making his way by join- 
ing a travelling circus which was going to Bull- 
ford, and earning his living by the exhibition of 
his snakes. At Bullford he fell in with some gip- 
sies, who seem to have recognized him as a supe- 
rior spirit of their race, and to have passed many 
nights in their company, learning the geography 
of the woods and grounds around The Towers, 
until the dawn of the expected day. Rockielaw, 
it seems, went out early that morning, and, as well 
as I could gather— rather from what he did not 
say than from anything he did say — he went out 
in a spirit of jealousy to meet Miss Carteret, who, 
as I also gather, had been in the habit of meet- 
ing our Swift in the woods. Our Indian’s way of 
attacking his victim was curious ; it is, I am told, 
not unknown in his part of the world. He brought 
his man down by the aid of a heavy ball of brass, 
thrown by the hand with great force and unerring 
aim. It struck poor Rockielaw on the back of the 
head, and knocked him senseless in a moment. 
Then our friend would have soon finished him but 
for Swift’s intervention. So much he told Amber 
and myself, with Oriental composure and Oriental 


TWO LETTERS. 


313 


apathy, after he had recovered consciousness, and 
only a little while before he committed suicide, 
having recognized that he had lost the game. The 
rest you know. It ’s a strange business altogether, 
is n’t it ? 

“ One other bit of news, less interesting and 
less important, but which, none the less, I must 
mention. The Bullford election is a thing of 
the past, and your friend Anthony Windover is a 
Member of Parliament. Is he to be pitied ? Is he 
to be congratulated ? Heaven knows ! However, 
I suppose it had to be. Kismet, as your friends 
say. It is a great experiment for me, and I do not 
know, after all, if I shall win any laurels and gar- 
lands, but I shall do my best ; and if I can’t be 
brilliant, I shall try at least to be decorous, in the 
fine old Roman sense of the phrase, which in the 
days that pass is not altogether a commonplace or 
conventional carriage. There, you see, I am be- 
ginning to boast already, the vice of the politician, 
so I shall stop. Look out for my maiden speech 
in the Times. They generally give a few lines to 
a man’s maiden speech, even when he is a man so 
insignificant as yours, while this machine is to 
him — 

** Anthony Windover.” 


Gabrid laid down the letter, The Bosphorus 


314 A WOMAN OF IMPULSE. 

shone in the sun, and perhaps its brightness daz- 
zled him, for there were tears in his eyes. 

“ The joy of eventful living,” he repeated to 
himself softly — “ the joy of eventful living.” 

Then he took up his pen and wrote a short let- 
ter to Windover, wishing him all good luck in his 
adventure. 


THE END. 










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TWO LIBRARIES OF FICTION. 


Ube Uncognito Xibrarp 

The American edition of Mr. Unwin’s “Pseudonym” Library, 
copyrighted for the United States. These volumes are printed 
in oblong 24mo, in a form convenient for the pocket, and bound 
in limp cloth. Price, each, 50 cts. 

“ This library is a veritable academy of new literary reputations.”— 

‘‘Ces petits volumes, jaunes, au format de carnet, si faciles k mettre dans la 
poche, d’une prix si modique et d’une lecture si attrayante .” — Le Livre Moderne. 

No. I.— THE SHEN’S PIGTAIL. By Mr. M 

“ This is the opening volume of a new series by the Messrs. Putnam, to be 
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The local flavor of the English settlements in China is given with relish, and the 
stories are not only good but are told with art and in a very neat and happy style.” 
—Philadelphia Times. 

No. II.— THE HON. STANBURY AND OTHERS. By 

“Two.” 

No. III.— LESSER’S DAUGHTER. By Mrs. Andrew 
Dean, etc. 

No. IV.— A HUSBAND OF NO IMPORTANCE. By 

Rita. 

No. V. — HELEN. By Oswald Valentine. 

ttbc Hutonsm Xibrarg 

Issued in co-operation with Mr. Unwin, of London. Copyrighted 
for the United States. Uniform with the “ Incognito Library.” 
Oblong 24mo, limp cloth, each 50 cts. 

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excellence attained by this first volume, its success is assured .” — London Speaker. 

No. II.— FOUND AND LOST. By Mary Putnam-Jacobi. 
No. III.— THE DOCTOR, HIS WIFE, AND THE CLOCK. 

By Anna Katharine Green. 


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f. 


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